Kerry Reid
Chicago Tribune
If you saw Silk Road Rising's magnificent production of Wajdi Mouawad's "Scorched" a couple of years ago, you might uncover some similarities with Adriana Sevahn Nichols' "Night Over Erzinga." Both move backward and forward in time to tell a sorrowful story rooted in war and atrocity, and both require a fluid ensemble in which actors play multiple related characters, such as a young mother in an earlier time and that same mother's grown daughter later on. In director Lisa Portes' beautifully crafted production, it's a rich, tensile and — given the grim back story — surprisingly funny multigenerational picture of what happens when people survive the unimaginable, only to find themselves utterly lost in a new world and at emotional odds with the people who are supposed to love and understand them the best. What Nichols teases out in many engaging ways is the question of how we use our dreams and our memories to sustain us — even when it would seem easier or even more salutary to forget both. Portes has assembled a terrific ensemble, with Sandra Delgado as young Alice and grown Ava doing some of the strongest work I've seen from her. Levi Holloway as young Ardavazt, Rom Barkhordar as the elder version, and Nicolas Gamboa as the conflicted but compassionate Bienvenido are also standouts in a cast loaded with smart and sensitive instincts. And Lee Keenan's set, with its overarching tree branches and quotidian kitchen-tile floor, captures the mix of profound family history and daily frustration Nichols lays bare.
Katy Walsh
Chicago Theater Beat
Playwright Adrianna Sevahn Nichols hits it hard with relational, cultural and mental anguish. The intensity is a brilliant mosaic of early twentieth century immigration mayhem and homeland insecurity. The acting is exceptional. Director Lisa Porters has the versatile cast morph into different generations of the same people.The talented ensemble tackle the decades long story with zest and sensitivity. In the lead, Sandra Delgado (young Alice/Ava) is outstanding. As Alice, she effectively goes back and forth from romantic dreamer to discontent housewife to asylum resident. Later, she plays Alice’s daughter with spunk and bitterness. With big expressive eyes and often saying nothing, Diana Simonzadeh (older Alice) haunts the stage. Simonzadeh perfectly illustrates a woman trapped in her own pain and hope. Playing multiple parts and using multiple accents, the multi-talented Michael Salinas gets huge laughs for his small roles. The central element of the set, designed by Lee Keenan, is a magnificent oversize tree with pieces of materials tied to its branches. The imagery symbolizes the strength of the family tree rooted in ancestry.
Oliver Sava
Timeout Chicago
As Nichols weaves together the past and present, Lisa Portes’s cast does strong work portraying different roles at various points in time. Delgado boldly transitions from Alice to Ava, losing the Armenian accent and gaining a youthful effervescence. Nicolas Gamboa gives a charismatic performance as Ava’s Dominican husband, Bienvenido.
Larry Bommer
Stage and Cinema
Playing Ardavazt and Alice as young and old partners, Sandra Delgado, Levi Holloway, Rom Barkhordar, and Diana Simonzadeh manage to be both astonishingly familiar and exotically unique, looking forward and backward as much as Rome’s Janus ever managed. Representing the third generation, Nicolas Gamboa and Delgado turn the culture clash that energizes and threatens their marriage into a series of gripping revelations. Michael Salinas switches wonderfully well between several portrayals, and Carolyn Hoerdemann is radiant even as she tackles seven disparate characters.
Johnny Oleksinski
Newcity Chicago
The unfathomable atrocity of the Armenian Genocide is the catalyst of Nichols’ drama that pits cultural heritage against assimilation and the family’s continuance against the individual’s dream. Director Lisa Portes has underscored the tumult of those events with stylized deluges into the pair’s childhoods back in Armenia, accompanied by verbally and physically expressed poetics. Under Lee Keenan’s web of metaphoric tree branches, Nichols’ Alice actually bears a passing resemblance to Lewis Carroll’s—this Wonderland, however, far more treacherous.
Michael Roberts
Showbiz Chicago
Sandra Delgado is stellar as young Alice and later as Ava. She has an innate on stage vulnerability that allows her to have two fantastic character arcs. Nicholas Gamboa commands the second act. He is reactive, sultry and emotionally fraught. Gamboa has great on stage chemistry with Delgado, but even more so with Rom Barkhordar’s older Ardavazt. The rest of the cast also turn in remarkable work, including Levi Holloway as the younger Ardavazt, Carolyn Hoerdemann as Ardavazt’s saintly mother, Michael Salinas as a menacing Turkish soldier and the always stunning Diana Simonzadeh who will make you weep for the love of your own mother with her portrayal as the mortal (and ghostly) matriarchs. Director Lisa Portes trusts her actors immensely as it pays off with very real relationships.
Bryce Isaacson
Chicago Theatre Review
Night Over Erzinga twinkles at Silk Road Rising. It is like a 50s-era epic. It has a massive, transgenerational scope, and richly fleshes out a great deal of characters. The story revolves around an Armenian family named Oghidanian, and chronicles the intimate details of no fewer than three generations. The stage is draped by the branches of an enormous tree. In its limbs hang pieces of clothing, like the ghosts of memory. The red and white checkered stage stretches out like a Dali painting, back into the Armenian sands of the past. Considering the skipping through time that occurs in the show, the scenery is appropriate. The story’s breadth is massive, and its texture feels like a combination of Fiddler on the Roof and The House on Mango Street, with splashes of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. The cast couldn’t be better. Sandra Delgado is fierce and mature as Alice, an attractive but strung-out woman who holds many secrets. Her daughter Estrella (Carolyn Hoerdemann) holds pain inside too, but is buoyed by her sunny Dominican husband, the exquisitely named Bienvenido Raymundo (Nicolas Gamboa). Gamboa is a radiant presence onstage, and his part is particularly well-written. I grew up in Latin American, and his every expression of thought and speech was a deadringer. Kudos to writer Adriana Sevahn Nichols for doing her homework. Rom Barkhordar also shows great range in multiple roles, but most notably as Older Ardavazt. He injects some much needed humor into the show, but also brings great gravitas when called for with a commanding voice and piercing, expressive gaze. Nichols has written a powerful story which is aided immensely by a superb cast.
Alice Singleton
Gapers Block
Erzinga is not a story about genocide, but a story about the "collateral damage" of genocide; the shame and shaming of the victims; the stench and aroma of madness that infects and plunders until the victim finds the key -- the lynchpin -- to unshackle themselves, first by finding the ways to accept that bitter herbs rest next to the sweetness of honey and apples in this life, the lives that came before, and Erzinga must be seen and experienced for what it is -- a remarkable work that resonates through all of us with a buy-in to the Family of Humankind.
Al Bresloff
Around the Town Chicago
Night Over Erzinga is an amazing World Premiere written by the incredible Adriana Sevahn Nichols, a detailed story of one family over a period of three generations. This is a family made up of Armenians and Dominicans that deals with the loss of family and how a grandmother can reach through time and unearth the true love and feelings of people who tend to keep all within themselves. The music by Peter J. Storms is sheer perfection to the moods being set in each of the scenes and the costuming (Elsa Hiltner) and lighting (Sarah Hughey) all add to the sheer magic of the production. Even the simple props (Jesse Gaffney) add to the overall flavor of the story. A simple pocket watch, on its own journey will give you a warm feeling about the relationship to this family. That is the magic of live theater.
John Olson
Talkin' Broadway
Atrocities are not precisely the theme of this ambitious and rich new play by Adriana Sevahn Nichols, but they are ever-present in this complex and compelling story of family and particular immigrant experiences in America. The stunning first act moves back and forth in time and geography between 1914-15 in Armenia and the '20s and '30s in Massachusetts. These abrupt shifts create an exceptionally meaty role for Sandra Delgado as Alice. Alice changes in age from 14 to late twenties and thirties in scenes that show her as an innocent teen, hopeful young adult, depressed housewife, and institutionalized patient. Delgado makes these shifts on a dime, and they are done with complete conviction and clarity. Alice's tragic and panoramic life is heartbreakingly real in Delgado's performance and we're with her throughout the gripping hour and fifteen-minute first act. In the second act, Delgado is given still another challenge—playing Alice's now-adult daughter (who now calls herself Ava) as a thirty-something in the early 1960s, with flashbacks to her teen years. The older Ava is a less complex character and, accordingly, Delgado's portrayal of it is less surprising than her work in the first act. In total, though, the actress's work in this play is formidable. Director Lisa Portes establishes a steady pace and finds striking ways to visualize the poetry of Nichols' words and ideas. The cast of eight seems larger than that as all except Holloway play multiple roles. A haunting performance is given by Diana Simonzadeh first as Alice's wise mother, then later as the older Alice after years of institutionalization. There's also some nice character work by Michael Salinas as a cop with a Boston Irish accent and as the delightfully slippery 1960s show biz impresario Johnny Jewels (as well as three other characters). The many locales and time periods are brought to life through the set by Lee Keenan and costumes by Elsa Hiltner, while Sarah Hughey's lighting design helps to manage the frequent time/place transitions. The greater resonance of Night Over Erzinga is that so many of our neighbors have tragedy or hardship in the family histories that brought them to North America. Seeing this play, we are gratefully reminded how much we can learn, in very human terms, about our world and our community.