The mathematicians in David Auburn’s “Proof” talk about equations like they’re works of art.
“Beautiful mathematics,” Catherine says, describing what her professor father searches for. “Answers to everything. The most elegant proofs, perfect proofs, proofs like music.”
This could also describe Auburn’s play, running in American Players Theatre’s indoor Touchstone space through Nov. 19. Full of tenderness and humor, “Proof” moves like a contemporary classic.
Hal (Nate Burger) talks with mathematician Robert (David Daniel) and his daughter Catherine (Kelsey Brennan) in "Proof" at American Players Theatre.
“Proof” had a moment some 20 years ago. Dozens of productions of Auburn’s Tony- and Pulitzer Prize-winning play went up in the early 2000s, including one at the defunct Madison Repertory Theatre. Gwyneth Paltrow and Jake Gyllenhaal starred in a 2005 film version.
Artistic director Brenda DeVita leads an excellent ensemble cast here, anchored by Kelsey Brennan’s arch, fiercely intelligent Catherine. At 25, Catherine has spent the last five years caring for her deteriorating father Robert (David Daniel), a venerated educator at the University of Chicago whose mental illness has left him unable to teach.
Her relationship with her older sister, Claire (Laura Rook) is strained, to put it generously. Her initial approach to one of her dad’s acolytes is pointedly hostile.
Kelsey Brennan plays Catherine and Nate Burger plays Hal in "Proof" by David Auburn, produced by American Players Theatre.
Brennan, often seen in comic roles, channels Catherine’s anxiety and exhaustion, eyes darting, shoulders clenched. She seems both impossibly young and older than her years. She’s closely attuned to her father’s mental state, and caring for him has extracted a cost on her formal education and social skills. After an impulsive kiss with Hal (Nate Burger), she darts away.
No actor working in Wisconsin right now does sarcasm better than Brennan, who can put so much ice into her lines, waves of chill are practically visible. It’s part of why she’s such a fabulous comedian. Here, that sarcasm plays defense, making a shield of grief and weaponized fear about how much of her brilliant, confused father’s mind lives in her.
“I probably inherited about one-one thousandth of my father’s ability,” Claire tells Hal. “It’s enough. Catherine got more. ... I’m not sure how much.”
Laura Rook and Kelsey Brennan play sisters in "Proof," running in the Touchstone at American Players Theatre. Lawrence E. Moten III designed the set.
As the older sister, Rook looks like she’s holding onto her smile with every muscle in her body. She’s careful around Catherine in a way that seems reasonable from one angle and infuriating from another. Burger is puppyish and endearingly awkward as Hal. He has so much nervous energy in some scenes he could crackle, like a human bug zapper.
DeVita moves her performers through each beat and revelation, communicating time period subtly in the width of the jeans and size of the cordless house phone. Over two and a half hours, her production of “Proof” sings, with details that wink at anyone paying attention.
Hal (Nate Burger) talks with Catherine (Kelsey Brennan) in "Proof" at American Players Theatre.
Set designer Lawrence E. Moten III’s messy mix of gently mouldering books, decorative sculptures picked up on sabbatical and weathered furniture says “professor’s house” as clearly as a neon sign. A winter flashback with Robert working furiously in the garden reveals that in an earlier scene, Catherine was wearing her dad’s sweater to keep warm. Jeanette Christensen designed the deceptively smart early-’00s costumes, some in shades of the autumn leaves beneath their feet.
DeVita reflects in her director’s notes that “Proof” explores the price of genius on people with a gift and those around them, “because nothing comes without a cost.” Auburn's genius is in the connection of that cost with love, obligation and regret. “Proof” pulls forward moment to moment, grounded in the real.
“No wasted moves,” as Hal says. “Just … elegant.”
