“Edith Wharton’s <i>The Age of Innocence</i> ,” adapted by Karen Zacarías, directed by Hana S. Sharif, 28 Feb.–30 Mar. 2025, Arena Stage, Washington, DC.

While this Arena Stage production of The Age of Innocence focused primarily on the same 1870s period that Wharton used for her 1920 novel of old New York, Hana S. Sharif’s program note insisted on “the contemporary resonance” of the drama (5). The director praised Zacarías’s “searing and sensual new play” for transporting “the past into the present” (5). For context, it is worth noting that the idea of adapting The Age of Innocence for the stage is not “new.” In Wharton’s lifetime, a theatrical version penned by Margaret Ayer Barnes enjoyed a highly successful run of over two hundred performances in 1928–1929, providing Wharton with a hefty payday. Although “contemporary” in some respects, Sharif’s project conceptually aligned with the tradition established by Wharton and extended by Barnes. Both the novel and the earlier treatment are preoccupied with the way one generation succeeds another, reshaping the world to enable progress while simultaneously sacrificing old norms, habits, and values. On top of such concerns, Sharif’s production explored other themes that matter in Wharton’s novel, such as “the politics of desire and the complexity of love” (5). The director’s results in animating these themes on stage and evoking another era for a 2025 audience were occasionally uneven yet generally successful, sometimes quite powerful.One respect in which the production situated itself in the twenty-first century was in its nontraditional casting. White, Black, and Asian performers made up the talented ensemble of twelve. Although such diversity was not found in the nineteenth-century social sphere about which Wharton wrote, or in the twentieth-century social sphere she inhabited, it was a welcome reminder of one way in which American society has made advances. The multiracial casting also related to the softening of divisions that in the story’s epilogue—decades after the central affair of The Age of Innocence—enables the heretofore inconceivable marriage between an Archer and a Beaufort (Dallas and Fanny).A standout among the various cast members was Felicia Curry in two roles: Granny Mingott and the narrator. While the former was a relatively minor part—as in Wharton’s story— the latter was arguably the most substantial in the show. In one light, this figure served as a proxy for Wharton. As narrator, Curry was on stage more than anyone else, a docent, tutoring the audience on the signs, customs, and practices of the Gilded Age. In addition, as if enjoying the omniscience of a narrator in a novel (like the original The Age of Innocence), she provided insight into the inner state of Newland Archer (A. J. Shivley) as he found himself increasingly conflicted about his obligations to May Welland (Delphi Borich) and his burgeoning attraction to Countess Ellen Olenska (Shereen Ahmed). Oftentimes, after setting up a scene with explanatory commentary on the setting and the season, the narrator stood at the edge of the stage, silently bearing witness to the unfolding drama. However, when Newland and Ellen shared a few fleeting moments of intimacy, Curry stepped off stage, out of deference to their privacy. Whereas she treated love and Newland’s struggle between duty and desire with seriousness, she was sometimes comedic in her observations about society. For instance, when describing the performance of Faust in the opening scene, she wryly remarked that “an unalterable and unquestioned law of the musical world required that the German text of French operas sung by Swedish artists should be translated into Italian for the clearer understanding of English-speaking audiences” (Wharton, Age 3). Her delivery made the practice sound absurd, underlining the snobbery of old-New-York elites and eliciting laughter from the house.As for the central romantic pair, both Ahmed and Shivley are quite striking individuals, and based purely on aesthetics, it was easy to imagine the two of them being drawn to one another. Yet the timing between them was at times off, particularly when they shared dialogue. Delivery was sometimes rushed, more often halting or marked by long pauses. Rather than providing a respite from the conventions and grinding momentum of public life, their private encounters felt labored. This might have been overlooked but for the fact that in both Wharton’s novel and this adaptation, the couple are supposed to discover an authentic connection, one that contrasts with the artificial, inhibited relationships of those around them. In addition, while Shereen was convincing in his ardor, Ahmed seemed more smitten in the middle of the story by the idea of freedom than she ever did by her suitor. Nonetheless, she effectively embodied a disruptor in the uptight ranks of American society. Ahmed simmered with barely contained sensuality, compelling attention from other characters and from the audience whenever she was under the lights. She was conspicuous not only because of her aesthetic appeal but also because of lush costumes crafted by Fabio Toblini. Although expensively dressed, other members of American high society sported muted colors, sometimes in combination, oftentimes in patterns, while in contrast, Ellen was clad in bright dresses of a single hue: first blue, then red, and finally green. With soft lines and elaborate bustles, the clothes looked decadent, and they revealed more flesh than those of the other female characters, adding to Ellen’s allure for men like Newland and Julius Beaufort (Paolo Montalban).Indeed, while the acting was capable, the most dynamic and memorable aspects of this production were its design choices. This is a circumstance Wharton might have appreciated given her own lifelong interest in interior design as well as fashion and architecture. In advance of the first theatrical adaptation of her Pulitzer Prize–winning novel, Wharton wrote in correspondence, “I am very anxious about the staging & dressing. I could do every stick of furniture & every rag of clothing myself, for every detail of that far-off scene was indelibly stamped on my infant brain” (Wharton to Jones 439). As suggested, the costumes were treated with a fitting degree of attention, though the major star of the production turned out to be the set by Tim Mackabee. Before the lights went down, it appeared business on the boards would be minimal. Four elaborate chandeliers of clear glass hung just a few feet above the floor, which was painted shiny black, inlaid with geometric patterns that made it appear costly. Nothing else was visible. Once the lights went down, however, the flexibility and ingenuity of Mackabee’s vision became apparent. In the center of the stage was a platform that could be lowered out of view then quickly returned. Sometimes the platform rose to feature performers, like the opera singers of Faust. At other times, it appeared with furniture—couches, chairs, tea caddies, floral arrangements, and more—that situated the drama in a new location. Simultaneously, different suspended lights were lowered or raised from the grid above the stage to differentiate settings. This allowed the production to move briskly from one drawing room to another; from a chapel to a coach; from St. Augustine, Florida, to Newport, Rhode Island. At each corner of the stage was an elevated box that could accommodate three or four people. While recessed in many scenes, these boxes could slide forward, as when representing a loge at the Academy of Music or an upper-story balcony in a Parisian building, like the one where Ellen resides in later life.Beyond Mackabee’s inventiveness, the theater-in-the-round presentation of the drama (or, more accurately, theater-in-the-square for the Zelda Fichandler Stage) amplified ideas of interest to Wharton, Zacarías, and Sharif. Eyes on every side created a panoptic effect in line with what dramaturg Otis Ramsey-Zöe described in the program as the “heightened surveillance state” of old New York (8). Every character was exposed to inspection from multiple angles, both in relation to other members of society and the house. This effect was exaggerated when characters attended shows and used lorgnettes to study one another. And as the narrator shifted her position, entering successive scenes from different sides, occasionally from above, occasionally from below, it stressed how disorienting old New York could be for those, like Ellen, who were outsiders. At the same time, the narrator’s constant need to orient viewers to the current pecking order made manifest how quickly status could change.Cleverly deployed props and effects held a good deal of meaning as well. During the Newport Archery Competition that began the second act, targets were brought out at which May shot imaginary arrows, with “thunking” sound effects confirming her hits. The scene showed Borich’s May to be clear-eyed, more discerning than her mien of pliability might suggest, while foreshadowing the precision with which she would fight not with arrows but with words to keep her husband. Soon after, when Beaufort fell from grace, the financial scandal in which he was embroiled was shared in a newspaper headline conveyed by the narrator. Then half a dozen performers arrayed all over the stage had a copy of the newspaper, which each held up like a shield as Beaufort approached, failing to find succor from former acquaintances.Another notable design element was the lighting by Xavier Pierce. It was repeatedly used to illustrate the moods of characters. When Newland learned that May’s family would allow an accelerated timetable for their marriage, for example, he was lit up in blue and gray, giving him a corpse-like pallor. The lighting stayed on him through a rapidly enacted marriage ceremony, making his nuptials appear a kind of death as he settled into the stifling “sameness” of domesticity (Wharton, Age 82).In some moments when Newland and Ellen were together, a red light washed over them, underscoring their mutual passion. In the final scene, as Newland kept his distance from the aged Ellen in her Paris apartment, he recalled in reverie her former glory, and Ahmed paraded across the stage, lit up with a gel that made her radiant and luminous as shadows engulfed the rest of the stage.Sharif’s production of The Age of Innocence bridged the distance between Wharton’s historical narrative and present-day sensibilities through diverse casting, innovative staging, and ingenious design choices. Despite some flatness in the portrayal of the central romance, the director along with her team constructed a visually striking and intellectually engaging adaptation that appealed to modern sensibilities, even as it helped the audience to appreciate “humanity more deeply by reflecting on the trials and tribulations of the societies that came before us—by the rules they heeded and the trends they bucked” (Pro-gram 5). The show’s impact was a testament not only to the extensive talents of those who realized it but also to the enduring interest of Wharton’s fiction.