STAGE WEST: "The Apiary" at New Village Arts Theatre

What's behind "The Apiary" at New Village Arts?             Photo by Jason Sullivan / Dupla Photography

            As literature, the influence and impact of science-fiction as a genre is unimpeachable: Asimov. Bradbury. Ursula K. Le Guin and Philip K. Dick. Sci-fi as a genre on the screen is practically as old as cinema itself, from Georges Melies’ silent “A Trip to the Moon” through the original “The Day the Earth Stood Still” to “2001: A Space Odyssey” and the upcoming Spielberg aliens thriller “Disclosure Day.”
            As theater? Well, not so much. Jordan Harrison’s “Marjorie Prime”? Thomas Gibbons’ “Uncanny Valley”? Meh.
            On the written page, science-fiction world-building can be meticulous in detail and technology and at the same time liberated, if the author chooses, from conventional narrative. It’s conducive to deep thought and the escapist imagination that only books can provide. In film, its visuals can inspire awe and dazzle, catalyzing emotions with sight and sound.
            What makes sci-fi sci-fi doesn’t seem to work very well onstage, and Kate Douglas “The Apiary” doesn’t, either. It’s talky and buzzy (my only bee pun, I promise) in only a techie sense, its characters underdeveloped and far less interesting than the bees they’re concerned with.
            New Village Arts tries strenuously to overcome these inherent deficiencies with its production of “The Apiary” directed by Kristianne Kurner. Translucent walls created by Santa Ana-based Kingspan Light + Air in the hands of NVA’s design team facilitate what looks like an actual apiary on the Carlsbad theater’s stage; sound effects by Miki Vale and Michael Wogulis’ projections successfully present the illusion that bees are in the house. The cast (Michelle Caravia, Adelaida Martinez, Milena Philips and Nio Russell) is grounded in the speculative – and more than slightly preposterous – tale that Douglas is trying to tell.
            This is that two science-minded beekeepers 22 years into the future discover a way to stem the rapidly diminishing population of bees by shocking, morally dubious means. Douglas is speculating that what is rare lachryphagy behavior in bees can be taken to an extreme. You’ll have to look that up, as I did.
            Because “The Apiary” is sci-fi, Douglas is empowered to take her premise wherever she wishes. Bending logic, defying accepted science is understood with the idiom. If only her narrative were less expository, her dramatic interactions more dynamic. At just less than an hour and a half, the production proceeds ploddingly, and the inevitable twist to the discovery that comes is underwhelming – I expected something that would shake the world beyond the story’s insulated apiary.
            Nio Russell’s multiple characters, freed from the one-note personalities and dry explanations of the beekeepers’ realm, are closest to being multi-faceted. They’re also closest to being really human in the way that I wanted all of the principals to be.
            If nothing else, “The Apiary” is a reminder of how precious – and important – bees are to the natural world. It asks us to consider whether any sacrifice, no matter how outrageous, is worth it to preserve their survival.
            “The Apiary” runs through Feb. 22 at New Village Arts Theatre in Carlsbad.