"Anna Christie"

June 7, 2012 — Northern New England Repertory Theatre Company presented Eugene O'Neill's Pulitzer Prize-winning "Anna Christie" at the Sawyer Center Theater at Colby-Sawyer College in New London, New Hampshire. Solid acting and skillful stagecraft held the sparse audience spellbound in the somewhat chilly theater.

Anna, estranged from her sea-going father since childhood, meets him in a New York bar. Delighted to be reunited with her, the father talks her into spending a few days with him on the barge of which he's the captain. She agrees, but things get complicated when several ship-wrecked sailors are rescued by the barge crew. One, an Irishman named Mat, falls head-over-heels for Anna.

High drama and dark humor fill the final acts when Mat's proposal of marriage forces Anna to reveal a shameful past, shocking Mat as well as her father. Katrina Ferguson as Anna, John Goodlin as her father, and Milan Dragicevich as Mat turn in stellar performances, more than doing justice to the fiery dialog, a challenge to actors in any O'Neill play.

"Anna Christie," in spite of its dark subject matter and harsh conflicts, in the end is more upbeat than most of O'Neill's work. You can leave the theater feeling good about it, especially when it's as well-acted as this production.