Beautiful ‘Blood Wedding’ Falls Short

Back in 1988, Cal State Fullerton mounted a visually strong but ultimately unsatisfying production of Federico Garcia Lorca’s difficult “The House of Bernarda Alba.” It’s the Spanish playwright’s even more demanding “Blood Wedding” this time around, with the same results.

Lorca’s lyrical dramas--”Blood Wedding” arguably is his most revered--are some of the more evocative of this century. They’re prose-poems, really, raised on the highly emotional foundation established by Greek tragedy, which Lorca sought to emulate through his career.

At Cal State Fullerton, director Monica Leite realizes that building a brooding atmosphere is Lorca’s trump card, as it was to the Greeks, and sets about forging a sensual environment at the campus’ Recital Hall.

With the help of lighting designer Tom Durante, the staging opens in muted darkness, with the actors holding only funeral candles. It’s a telling effect, inspiring images of the church and its mysterious rituals (a frequent Lorca device) and hinting of the deaths to come.

Set designer Ann Sheffield’s scenery is also intriguing. A black ramp leads up to the stony white facade of a Spanish manor, a tangle of spidery shadows cast by branches falling ominously across. The stage is framed to one side with a shroud-like curtain and the colors everywhere are rich and earthy.

But the success of this “Blood Wedding” ends with its looks. The acting just isn’t convincing enough to fully bring to life the simple yet wrenching story of a bride who is kidnapped by an old lover on the day of her marriage.

Most of the performances have surface tension--there’s a lot of troubled-to-feverish line-readings as Lorca takes us through a quietly reflective first act, then slams us into the second filled with eroticism, anger and violence.

But we come away from this production not really knowing the erotic strength of the bonds between the bride (Laura Hart) and Leonardo (Scott Manuel Johnson), her lover. Nor is the connection between the bride and her husband (Alessandro Trinca) fully explored.

And with Lorca, a writer who creates dramatic power through our absorption with his arch characters, that just won’t do.

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BE THERE

“Blood Wedding,” Cal State Fullerton’s Recital Hall, 800 N. State College Blvd.. 8 p.m. today, 2:30 and 8 p.m. Saturday, 5 p.m. Sunday. $5 and $7. (714) 278-3371. Ends Sunday. Running time: 2 hours, 5 minutes.