Marie Curie (Francesca Faridany, left) plays Marie Curie, and Kate Mulgrew is Hertha Ayrton in Lauren Gunderson’s The Half-Life of Marie Curie.
The sad history of radioactive relationships must, by definition, begin with Marie Curie, the woman who coined the term “radioactivity.” In 1911, the widowed madame had an affair with the physicist Paul Langevin, a married former student of her late husband. The ensuing scandal, which was uncovered concurrently with the awarding of her second Nobel prize, nearly cost her her reputation. And while this heated dalliance drives the story in Lauren Gunderson’s instructive new work, The Half-Life of Marie Curie, it is framed by another of Curie’s relationships, the platonic friendship she shared with the electrical engineer and suffragette Hertha Ayrton.
As written by Gunderson and flatly staged by director Gaye Taylor Upchurch, this 85-minute one-act often operates like a biography class that occasionally breaks out into a play, with its two characters frequently turning toward the audience to dish out their matter-of-fact chronology. Luckily though, it is a tale forged by interesting decisions, human faults and, yes, the effects of radiation. Plus, the piece is impeccably cast.
Curie ponders the radiance of radium. Photographs by Joan Marcus.
As Curie, veteran actor Francesca Faridany not only looks the part but emits as many unexpected sparks as the vial of radium that Curie unwittingly, or perhaps self-destructively, wears around her neck. Meanwhile, the always enjoyable Kate Mulgrew, as Ayrton, more than ever seems the sum of her past parts. There is the crisp diction and feminist fury of her turn as Katharine Hepburn in Tea at Five, the stern compassion of her Captain Janeway in Star Trek: Voyager, and the rebellious spunk of her Orange Is the New Black character, Galina.
The play begins with a brief “ode” from each character. Curie draws out a metaphor inspired by radioactive decay amid the soft clicking of a Geiger counter. Then Ayrton explains her work. Here, lighting designer Amith Chandrashaker pulls off a clever little trick, cross-lighting Faridany from either side of the stage in a nod to one of Ayrton’s achievements, the redesign of the arc lamp, which generates an electrical arc in the charged space between two carbon rods.
The action then moves to Curie’s home in France where Ayrton has arrived, from England, to help protect her friend from the press and the angry mobs swarming around her amid the backlash of her sex scandal. They bemoan their place in a man’s world, Albert Einstein makes a cameo appearance in the form of a fan letter, and Curie hints at the emotional dilemma that will at times overwhelm her: “I might’ve finally stopped feeling, actually. I can’t decide if I’m shattered or slowly evaporating.”
Seeking refuge, Curie decides to travel to Britain to spend time with Ayrton at her summer house in Highcliffe (There’s a definite lighting transition, but Rachel Hauck’s scenic design remains basically unchanged.) Here, more backstory is spilled out amid sips of whiskey, reflections on their children and clever, feminist observations. Ayrton notes how the scientific community cannot fathom her being both a married woman and a physicist, while having “no problem with the contradiction that light is both a wave and a particle.”
In the night’s most theatrical turn, Curie takes a dip in the ocean, finding a moment’s peace in her aqua-lit submergence. But by the final scene, any pretense of an ocean floor or a fourth wall has vanished, and the duo simply and directly inform the audience as to their fate and the fate of their children, with Curie making this timely assessment before her passing:
I outlasted them. The gossips, the outrage. Who even remembers it now? Something so powerful diminished by time. But then again isn’t that the story of the world.
Ayrton and Curie in the Audible Theater production.
Audible, the Amazon-owned audiobook giant, produced this work through its Emerging Playwrights Fund, a $5 million enterprise with the mission of creating new stage pieces that will also live on as audio plays. For the most part, it has been a huge blessing for Off-Broadway. Previous Audible Theater productions include David Cale’s fine Harry Clarke and Carey Mulligan’s potent Girls & Boys. The lovely Minetta Lane Theater, with its exposed brick walls and impressively tall and deep stage, has found a new purpose. And a fresh crop of young playwrights are, each year, given the resources to create new works.
Still, given the generally expository proceedings on display here, one wonders about the self-imposed limitations put upon a playwright knowing that their work’s ultimate fate is to be heard and not seen. Do they create new waves of expression, or sweep away the particles of a play that would otherwise be more fully explored?
The Half-Life of Marie Curie runs through through Dec. 22 at the Minetta Lane Theatre (18 Minetta Ln,). Evening performances are at 7 p.m. Tuesday–Saturday; matinees are at 2 p.m. Saturdays and 3 p.m. Sundays. For tickets and information, visit thehalflifeofmariecurie.com.
