Berkshire on Stage

Far too many theaters for my taste tend to offer feel-good, holiday-themed, peppermint and sugar-cookie flavored entertainment this time of year. So I am very pleased to announce that Albany Civic Theater, at least, has opted to instead present for their December show a play about hardy women in the hard sciences titled The Half Life of Marie Curie.

Marie Curie is fairly well-known as a pioneering turn-of-the-century female scientist–the first woman to win a Nobel Prize and the first person ever to win two Nobels. But this play is more about Marie Curie as a human than as a larger-than-life scientist. The Half Life of Marie Curie takes place in the wake of Curie’s affair with another scientist and the media campaign that drove her from her home and nearly ruined her reputation. 

The Half Life of Marie Curie takes place in different locations in two different countries, and so set designer David Zwierankin has taken care to create a set that is generic enough to serve as both Marie Curie’s home and the summer house of her English friend, Hertha (and, at one point, the beach) rather than splitting the stage. This allows both characters to make the most of Albany Civic’s small stage space throughout the play. And despite the stage being a somewhat generic turn-of-the-century living space, the tall and well-stocked bookshelf on the stage right wall makes it clear that the homes being portrayed belong to two brilliant and learned people. (This is brought home all the more when the lights go down and we see the notes and equations glowing green on the walls like radium paint.) The costumes are similarly simple and versatile, as each character only wears one costume throughout the show; Marie’s smart lavender dress and Hertha’s black blazer and simple skirt fit their respective characters well and reflect their overall personalities.

Emily Rae Fernandes brings the human elements to the character of Marie Curie beautifully, while still portraying the heroine as the scientific genius that she undoubtedly was. Throughout the play, Marie is brilliant, vulnerable, unsure, loving, and stubborn. The only other character in this play is the British engineer, mathematician, and suffragette, Hertha Ayrton–a less well-known historical figure than Marie Curie but with equal scientific contributions to her name. Hertha is played by Jennifer Van Iderstyne with all the fire and indomitability one might expect from a female mathematician and suffragette at the turn of the Twentieth Century. The Half Life of Marie Curie is a two woman tour-de-force and both Fernandes and Van Iderstyne shine in their respective roles. 

My only complaint about the two characters is that while Marie Curie is given so much depth of character, with moments of resilience and moments of despair, Hertha lacks the same depth. She is very entertaining as she rages about womens’ rights and quips about the various injustices and hardships she and other women face, but she lacks the vulnerability that makes Marie Curie’s character so compelling. Hertha is the sardonic and stalwart friend that every woman hopes to have, but as a character in her own right she never quite reaches the same depths as the titular character. On the flip side, Marie Curie isn’t given an opportunity to play the stalwart and resilient friend for Hertha to lean on, and the dynamic of the two women is a bit one-sided. This, I must note, seems to be the fault of playwright Lauren Gunderson rather than of either actress. As much as I want this play to be about all the ways women can uplift other women, it is much more about Marie Curie as a human being and a dear friend whose main function in the play is to support and uplift her at her lowest.

While the action of the play takes place between the two main characters, the two women occasionally give exposition about themselves and their world through monologues directed to the audience. The play begins and ends with these sorts of monologues, and while the exposition at the beginning was useful and well-paced, the ending narrated the rest of the lives of the protagonists up until their deaths in a way that moved too fast and somehow still dragged. It is unclear why Gunderson felt the need to end the play with the deaths of her two protagonists, but it seems a strange choice considering that the play takes place in the middle of the characters lives, before many of their notable achievements, and doesn’t seem overly concerned with the mortality of the characters until the ending.

But despite a questionable ending, The Half Life of Marie Curie delivers an overall satisfying and highly entertaining story about friendship and scientific curiosity, about history and science and the human emotions behind creation and discovery, with a bit of philosophy and poetry sprinkled on top for added flavor. Whether you are going to the theater looking for thought provoking philosophy, heartwarming feminist drama, or the witty humor of women making their own history in a man’s world, The Half Life of Marie Curie will not disappoint!

Albany Civic Theater presents The Half-Life of Marie Curie by Lauren Gunderson, directed by Laura Darling, runs from December 1-17, 2023, at Albany Civic Theater, 235 Second Avenue in Albany, NY. Stage Manager: Rachel Stewart. Light Board Operator: Joe Plock. Sound Board Operator: Robert Stewart. Cast: Emily Rae Fernandes as Marie Curie and Jennifer Van Iderstyne as Hertha. Understudies: Ash Visker and Carol Charniga. Costume design by Jen Bart. Hair & Makeup by Laura Darling, Rachel Stewart, and Jen Bart. Set design by David Zwierankin. Properties by Mark Salomon. Specialty props by Jen Bart. Lighting design by Laura Darling and David Zwierankin. Sound design by Sean Baldwin.

Performance dates are Friday–Sunday December 1-17. Friday and Saturday curtains are at 7:30 pm and Sundays are matinees only at 3:00 pm. Tickets are $18, student tickets are available for $10. Runs approximately 1 hour and 40 minutes with one intermission. Contains brief discussions of sex and adultery. Recommended for ages 8+. Tickets are available online through the Albany Civic Theater website, by phone, or at the door for any performance. Call 518-462-1297 or visit albanycivictheater.org for more information.