"dynamic, spirited, and intensely moving..."

The miracle of William Gibson’s The Miracle Worker now playing in a dynamic, spirited and intensely moving production at the Berkshire Theatre Festival is not just the obvious one—that a desperately dedicated young woman, against seemingly impossible odds, teaches a blind, deaf, mute child to speak.

The second miracle is that in this play which is about WORDS, the leading character, Helen Keller, (Justina Trova) during the two hour play has only one line, speaks only one word.

It is also important to note the word is that evocative and life-sustaining one—“water”. Whether Gibson means it to or not, the word brings into his life-enhancing play a symbol—not just any word that unlocks the closed doors of the child’s mind, but a word that lets that releasing moment beside the pump become a kind of baptism that welcomes the lost child into the humanity of which she is a part.

In this production it is a moment that releases tears you did not expect, especially if you knew the plot as many in the audience may, because this dynamic on-stage production is one that involves the audience emotionally in a way no film version can. And the cast is magnificent.

Trova’s performance is riveting as she becomes the lost child who, trapped in her mute world, can only flail out, a whirl wind of flying arms, against the world that she cannot reach. But her anger and her agony at sensing she must communicate, but not even knowing what she is sensing, is there every moment in her amazingly mobile face. Just watching the face of this young actress, communicating to the audience, without her seeming aware of it, is a lesson in acting.

The miracle worker of the title, Annie Sullivan (Tabitha McKown) is dedicated, feisty, and deeply moving. In moments of lonely almost despair, she may be haunted by her dead brother, her own climb from blindness, but she is spirited and can when challenged as to her unique ability to help Helen, offer as her defense, “Because I have been blind. Some have the luck of the Irish.” McKown’s Sullivan faces her world bravely, struggling brilliantly in the scene of physical violence when her own arms must flail and subdue those of the resisting child. The two are a splendid duo.

As Kate Keller, mother of the seemingly doomed child, Jennifer Roszell is poignantly appealing, over-protective in her love, yet willing to try anything that may have a chance of helping free her child from the silent world she inhabits. The scream she utters over the baby’s cradle when she realizes with horror that the child the doctor has just pronounced out of danger, is sightless, is there behind her eyes in all the pleading love of the later scenes.

Michael Hammond as Captain Keller, recently back from t he Civil War, where when he spoke and men obeyed, brings a commanding presence into the play. He loves/hates the child who is breaking his young wife’s heart, whose actions are tearing the family apart as literally as the back wall of the scenery which during the course of the play will offer a jagged scar. He heads a family he can no longer control by shouting his decrees. As played by Hammond, he is a well-rounded character especially moving in his frustrated relationship with his near-adult son.

That son, effectively played by Kasey Mahaffy manages to project his own insecurities in his place in the troubled family in a role that begins as mockingly derisive but moves on to one of greater depth.

Indeed all the minor roles are effectively delineated, and to have William Swan, a veteran of fifty years of acting on the BTF stage, present as the reassuring doctor in the opening scene, brings a much admired actor into this very Berkshire dominated play that we feel belonging to the Berkshires because the celebrated author is one we have for years chatted with in the local library, and because many of its actors have Berkshire roots.

The Miracle Worker long ago achieved prize-winning status as a play and has proved rewarding in countless productions all over the world. We all know that. What this reviewer wishes to convey is that the current production in Stockbridge is an especially effective one and one not to be missed.