Three-Star Classic

(2 of 4)

But they never get there because before they know it, life has passed them by. The spineless Andrey marries a vulgar, voracious shrew (Ruth Gordon), and winds up a cuckold. The unhappily married Masha has a love affair with an unhappily married army officer (Dennis King), loses him when he is sent to another regiment. Olga, the most resigned, becomes headmistress of a high school. Irina, cheated of romance, is ready to marry for affection when her fiancé is killed in a duel.

A gradual and delicate sense of loss—the way people suddenly discover they are old—hovers over The Three Sisters. Everybody's life drips away in a slow leak. If there is no real despair at its end, it is because there was no real exultation at the beginning. Warmly as Chekhov reveals the pathos in these people's lives, he just as sharply exposes the self-pity. Not circumstances, but character defeats them. They forever sigh; they never struggle. Only Andrey's predatory wife gets what she is after. Chekhov neither bemoans their fate nor berates their faults; he merely smiles.

Though it has been superbly produced by Russians, The Three Sisters has never wholly come off in U.S. productions. But during its pre-Broadway tryout, Actress Cornell's production pumped enough life and emotion into the play to raise hopes that this time it would come off. McClintic's made-to-order translation is free from barnacles. His direction is sensitive.

Three Stars in a Russian Twilight. Playing their smallest roles since they achieved fame,* surprisingly the talented cast never try to upstage each other. Dressed (as Chekhov decreed) in inky black, Actress Cornell can do little but moon and yearn. But Actress Gordon is all purr and pounce. And Actress Anderson, in the play's most self-effacing role, gives an admirably self-effacing performance.

Though all three portray women under 30, Actress Gordon is 46, Actresses Anderson and Cornell 44. With 42-year-old Helen Hayes, they are the peak U.S. actresses of the peak generation for acting. All three went on the stage in their teens. All three achieved fame in their 20s. All have distinction without beauty. All have remarkable voices. All are crazy about Director McClintic, Greta Garbo,* one another. All are quite unlike.

Palpably Cornell. With her heavily lidded eyes set in a masklike face, her mannered gestures and soulful air, Actress Cornell is much more a great stage personality than a great actress. She is always, whatever she plays, palpably Katharine Cornell. She is always, even in comedy roles, on the verge of emotionalism: she has herself confessed that she is interested only in emotional parts. That interest has tempted her at times to rest on her aura—to appear in such trashy plays as The Green Hat and Dishonored Lady as well as such classics as Romeo and Juliet and Saint Joan.

Married 21 years ago, Actress Cornell and Director McClintic have lived ever since in a spacious Manhattan house overlooking the East River. For the last 17 years he has directed all but one of his wife's plays. For the last eleven years she has been her own producer. Sometimes the McClintics disagree over plays (he was thumbs down on The Green Hat, she on The Barretts of Wimpole Street, her greatest success) but they get along by "pampering" each other.