Review: 'Vilna' takes Jewish prisoners on a desperate quest

“The Holocaust is so overwhelming that we only really look at the end of the story — and that isn’t the whole story,” an archaeologist says in the article. “The whole story is the history of Jews who lived in this area for many, many centuries.”

Ira Fuchs’ “Vilna” — inspired by that New York Times article, created in a playwriting workshop in 2016 and now having its premiere at the Theater at St. Clement’s — is an attempt to honor that past. Paying homage to Jewish life in Vilnius, it’s a work of historical fiction that means to make large-scale atrocity palpable, comprehensible and urgently relevant to the present.

That’s a laudable but elusive goal, and in Joseph Discher’s inert production, “Vilna” feels dutiful and strangely hermetic.

Motke Zeidel (Sean Hudock) is 11 when we first encounter him, in 1926. By then, we’ve already met his ghost (Mark Jacoby), an old man whose narration begins and ends the play. So we know from the start that Motke — based on a real person — made it out of the Holocaust alive.

He and Yudi Farber (Seamus Mulcahy), an orphan who becomes his not-quite-official brother, are the central characters in this crowded story, which traces a thriving Jewish community under increasing assault.

Motke grows up to be a lawyer, forbidden, because he is Jewish, from practicing law. Yudi becomes an engineer, who, during World War II, draws up plans for Nazi “extermination plants” with subtle, chronic flaws built in. Together, at play’s end, they will tunnel toward freedom — which may sound like a spoiler but isn’t.

Hudock and Mulcahy give thoughtful performances, and the rest of the cast is mostly fine as well. But the many characters and relationships are too shallowly written to allow us to care about them other than in the abstract. As “Vilna” unfolds over 18 years, its sheer sprawl dilutes it. The first time the man next to me nodded off, we were in 1931.

The cavernousness of the theater works against the storytelling, too, especially since Discher tends to use only small slices of the bi-level set (by Brittany Vasta) at a time. In the loud silence of the space, and the pitch darkness beyond the stage, the play feels isolated — each scene sealed off, divorced from the larger historical tragedy.

It’s particularly unfortunate that only toward the end does the production acquire much in the way of energy — with the arrival of a Nazi officer (Paul Cooper) who relishes his own villainy, and with some belatedly inventive staging.

In a soft and narrow beam of light (designed by Harry Feiner), Yudi and Motke lie chest-down, one behind the other, digging the tunnel bit by bit. Their task is daring but also intimate, and in the scale of this brotherly moment we can feel their humanity.

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Event Information:

‘Vilna’

Through April 14 at the Theater at St. Clement’s, New York City; 212-239-6200, vilna-the-play.org. Running time: 2 hours 30 minutes.