Merritt Janson Speaks and Plays Autumn Sonata at the Yale Rep

MERRITT JANSON AS HELENA IN AUTUMN SONATA. PHOTO BY JOAN MARCUS, COURTESY YALE REPERTORY THEATRE

You know that line in “Comedy Tonight,” the Sondheim song from A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum?:

“She plays Medea later this week!”

Well, Merritt Janson plays Rosalind in Shakespeare’s comedy As You Like it later this year at the balmy Shakespeare & Company in the Berkshires.

First, she must languish thorough the role of Helena in a stage adaptation of Autumn Sonata at the Yale Rep. The show began previews last Friday, opens Thursday (April 21) and runs through May 7. Tickets and info at (203) 432-1234 or www.yalerep.org.

Not only is the play based on the somber film by the legendarily chilly auteur Ingmar Bergman, it’s directed by a guy renowned for bringing the darkness: Robert Woodruff, one of the most mindwarping mavericks in the regional theater realm.

Doing projects with Woodruff, Janson says, is “draining and challenging and inspiring. It’s the kind of draining you like. But you do need to recover after them. This is a brutal text to work on.”

Janson studied with Woodruff at the ART/MXAT institute at Harvard. Woodruff now teaches at the Yale School of Drama, and has blessed and blistered the Yale Rep with the harrowing stage spectacles Notes from Underground and Battle of Black and Dogs. This is the third time Janson and Woodruff have worked together on major productions. First was Britannicus for at the American Repertory Theatre. Then Notes from Underground began at the Rep and recently finished a tour. While still involved with that Dostoyevskyan deconstruction last fall, Woodruff approached Janson to see  if she was interested in helping transmogrify Bergman’s music-laden drama of mother/daughter bonding.

(The director also signed up another Notes from Underground collaborator, Michael Attias, to compose new music for Autumn Sonata. Attias performed as both a musician and an actor in Notes, and his translation of Battle and Black and Dogs was the basis for Woodruff’s Rep production.)

“Britannicus at ART, this, Notes from Underground—and I’ve played piano in all of them,” Janson gushes. “I love that Robert used me as a musician as well as an actor. There are other productions I’ve played music in, but not this way.” Her character in the play is a skilled pianist. Helena is also physically and mentally challenged, and becomes part of a psychological battle between her sister Eva (Rebecca Henderson) and their mother Charlotte (Candy Buckley).

Woodruff’s directing process appears to be a rare mix of extensive preparation and complete openness. “He spends unbelievable energy and time before we enter the room. The designers as well—they put in so much time, thought and energy into recreating this world.” In adapting Autumn Sonata, for instance, Woodruff not only consulted Bergman’s published screenplays (which differs slightly from the final film), he commissioned a literal translation of the film’s Swedish dialogue and investigated the subtle differences in various subtitled versions.

“But,” Janson continues, “when he has a question during rehearsals, he poses it to the entire room. It’s a gift to the actor, how open he is.”

Woodruff often builds shows from other media, but never fails to offer a fresh interpretation or a contemporary connection. “He does plays with this idea of character versus the action,” Janson suggests. The director’s also unafraid of inaction: his productions often have actors standing on the outskirts of scenes they’re not in. As Janson puts it, she’s always in character “but there are varying  levels to where the character is. You can see characters when they’re not in the scenes. Robert’s not interested in respecting artifice—he’s looking for a stronger truth.”

Woodruff does have a lighter side, evinced by his ‘90s collaborations with The Flying Karamazov Brothers juggling troupe on The Comedy of Errors and Room Service.  But when asked if there are any comic moments in Autumn Sonata, she reacts as if she’s asked about the moon being made of cheese. “No. There is beautiful intensity. Emotional upheaval, moments of revelation. But light? No.”

Janson herself seems emotionally balanced enough, considering all the chill of Bergman in the theater, not to mention New Haven’s still cold and rainy weather. In our interview at Atticus Bookstore Café the day before the show’s first preview she’s peppy, upbeat, animated, in living color. The expressive doe-eyes which gave needed warmth to Notes from Underground are bright and attentive. She’s dressed comfortably, not in the gowns and tight garments Repgoers are used to seeing her in. She’s got her skateboard by her side and she’s asking where the good small rock clubs are. In Autumn Sonata, she gets to play C.P.E. Bach’s Solfeggietto—“It’s something I learned when I was a teenager; it’s a very personal piece for me”—but she says “the guitar was my main instrument for a while. I played music my whole like: barrelhouse, honky tonk…”

Her own lifelong love of music led to a revelation about how to play Helena. “When beginning to work on Lena, I had to work out her physical and emotional parameters. I was making the sounds and movements which seemed essential. And I had this ‘Aha!’ moment, realizing it was something I was doing technically with the music, but that it wasn’t technical. It is her language. That’s how music is. Non-verbal. More powerful than words. It feels so right that Lena should also play music. She’s this great connection between the two strong personas” of Charlotte and Eva.

Rock on, Lena.