Sexy, thought-provoking ambiguity – not ambivalence

Promotional materials for the Rep’s Venus in Fur all feature the same image: a woman, half-shadowed, in a black leather corset that stops to expose her back at the shoulder blades and a strip of skin where the corset’s laces criss-cross. Beside it, text proclaims: “The hottest and sexiest date night in Milwaukee.”

It’s an image paralleled in the play itself, although not always how you’d expect. In one scene, leading woman Vanda pulls out her copy of Venus in Furs, a proto-S&M novel by Leopold von Sacher-Masoch (for whom masochism was in fact named), and shows her companion Thomas the cover: a woman in thigh-high patent-leather boots with a riding crop. But the funny thing is that Vanda knows to say the thing we don’t always realize we’re thinking when we look at those corsets and thigh-highs – “Put that on the poster, you’ll sell out.”

It’s that metatextual awareness that director Laura Gordon likes about Venus in Fur, the David Ives play opening at the Stiemke Studio this weekend. She describes the play as a “complex little beast,” the story of a director seeking actresses for his adaptation of Venus in Furs who encounters a woman who might be too much what he’s looking for.

“He’s had a really frustrating day, seeing a bunch of actresses who just weren’t right … and this woman explodes into the room to audition,” Gordon said. As the man responsible for hiring her, Gordon says, Thomas starts with the upper hand, but Vanda isn’t the average woman, and the room’s balance of power shifts back and forth over the course of the audition.

And yes, given the nature of the play it does make for a pretty sexy evening, Gordon says – but that’s not the only thing she and actors Reese Madigan and Greta Wohlrabe have found in the script, nor is it the only thing she hopes the audience will take away from the production. “That will get a certain audience in there,” Gordon said, “but what I’m hoping is that they have this really cool ride where maybe that’s what got them there or maybe it seems like a cool thing to go to on a date, but it raises some really interesting questions about what it is to find or to search for a partner, if you’re feeling lonely and you’re looking for someone to complete you.”

Rep artistic director Mark Clements cast both actors before deciding on Gordon as the show’s director, but she says she couldn’t have been happier with the duo, who she’s never directed but has worked with as co-actors. “I was relieved when that was the casting that was handed to me, because I think to go out cold and search for two actors to play this role would have been daunting. … There was this potential for some great chemistry between them, which is super obviously important when you have a two-person play that’s about sexual chemistry.”

As the sexual catalyst, Vanda is the production’s more distinctive role (even more so in the wake of her original portrayer, Nina Arianda, precociously winning a Tony for the part last year), and Gordon says Wohlrabe is more than up to the challenge of playing this charismatic chameleon of a role.

One thing that surprised her, though, was how Madigan fought for Thomas’ point of view, constantly challenging simpler renderings of his character. “It would be really easy to just give over and play some stereotypic jerky guy, but he’s fighting so hard to try and make his points clear,” Gordon said. “He’s outnumbered a lot [Gordon’s assistant director Frank Honts, is male, but much of the rest of the production team is female] so I think that a female point of view could run wild with it, if we wanted to.” Instead, Gordon says, the play has become more complex, with multiple truths held constant simultaneously.

“There’s a running commentary in [Venus], where the female character, Vanda, will say ‘Oh, I see, you’re just trying to be ambivalent,’” Gordon said. “And he says, ‘No I’m not. Ambiguous.’ ‘Oh, right, ambiguous.’ That’s this running thing which I think is David Ives just saying ‘No, really, it’s not just vague, we have a couple different ideas going on here.’”

That’s Venus in Fur, the kind of play that comes out and says something like that. Of course, it’s also the kind of play that puts its lead character in her underwear half the show. A complex little beast indeed.

David Ives’ Venus in Fur runs at the Rep’s Stiemke  from Sept. 25 to Nov. 3. Tickets start at $25 [subject to change during run]. To order, call (414) 224-9490 or visit the Rep’s website.