BY SANDY STAGGS

DRAMA CRITIC & PUBLISHER

The days in Bucks County, Pennsylvania are halcyon indeed, but a little longer especially when they’re spent slurping coffee on the screened porch, lamenting about the good ole days and wondering what could have been.

That’s the preamble for Christopher Durang’s “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” which garnered the 2013 Tony Award for Best Play (starring David Hyde Pierce and Sigourney Weaver) and is already selling out shows in Attic Salt Theatre’s new production in Asheville.

This hysterical work is set in the Hardwicke family home shared by two eccentric “spinster” siblings: the adopted and bi-polar Sonia (Jane Hallstrom) and her taciturn gay brother, Vanya (Adam Jack Arthur), who have cohabit mostly in peace since losing both parents to Alzheimer’s. Their weekend is interrupted by an unexpected visit from their world-renowned movie star sister (and benefactor) Masha (Christy Montesdeoca) and her new boy toy Spike (Henry Williamson III).

Yes, HardH the Hardwicke children were all named after Anton Chekhov characters (i.e. “The Three Sisters”) by their professor parents and Durang cleverly weaves other Chekhovian references into the story like the blue heron that feeds on their pond and a play within the play (“The Seagull”), an argument over how many cherry trees comprise an orchard (“The Cherry Orchard”) and obviously “Uncle Vanya.”

And while any delineation to the great Russian playwright’s creations exist in name only, any of these characters would be cozy in a cherry orchard (or any Fellini or Wes Anderson film for that matter). Hallstrom arguably has the meatiest part as the insecure wallflower Sonia — perhaps a northern cousin to Lenny in “Crimes of the Heart.” She is in a constant state of despondency about her Chekhovian existence and throws coffee cups, randomly yells “I haven’t lived!” and, in a fit of liberation, impersonates Dame Maggie Smith (a la “California Suite”) in a red sequin Oscar gown. Ms. Hallstrom delivers in earnest Sonia’s neuroses, her intelligence and ultimately, her sanity; and her extended phone conversation monologue with a potential suitor was especially charming.

Arthur plays the reserved Vanya who sits idly during the entire first act with an occasional stir when Spike the exhibitionist parades around in his underwear, which he does for about half his stage time. But in the second act during an impromptu performance of his apocalyptic play, we see Arthur shine when he explodes into a tirade and diatribe about everything from the Disney Musketeers and “The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet” to the art of letter writing and licking an old-fashioned stamp.

Montesdeoca is sublime as Masha, the beautiful jet setting star who has subsidized her siblings for years, but now — with five failed marriages and a career in decline — wants to sell the ancestral home. Ms. Montesdeoca delights in this pseudo-stereotypical role saturated in both in ego and insecurity as she softly barks orders at the others and intimidates them into be dwarves to her Snow White for a costume party. And she is incessantly afraid that Spike, an actor she is molding and, will abandon her for a younger woman, such as her off-stage assistant Hootie Pie or the young neighbor Nina, a fresh-faced Josephine Thomas who coincidentally played “the” Nina in a Mountain Art Theatre production of “The Seagull.”

Williamson is perfectly cast as the pretty-but-dumb actor whose 15 minutes of fame almost got him cast in an “Entourage” sequel; and he is also a trouper for maintaining his wits even in his undies.

Amanda Hunt rounds as the cast as Cassandra the soothsayer and part-time housekeeper, who like her namesake in Greek mythology suggests, is cursed with the gift of prophecy, but no one believes her. Cassandra is equal parts preacher, astrologer, New Age voodoo priestess and espouser of gibberish and Hunt has the cantankerous presence and Louisiana bayou voice of the housekeeper Velma Crowther in the Southern gothic film “Hush… Hush, Sweet Charlotte” (the great Agnes Moorehead) and the comedic gestures of a young Carol Burnett. Her Cassandra may be a wee over-the-top but “Vanya” is one whacky script and Hunt is affable and quite amusing.

Deftly directed by Jeff Catanese (Artistic director and co-founder with Producer Marci Bernstein), “Vanya” is all about the performances, which are all hyper-stylized and polished. The set, lighting and sound designs are sans frills in the intimate 35 Below Black Box Theatre, but Carina Lopez does a noble job with the costumes, especially the Oscar gown and colorful Disney attire.

“Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” certainly embraces absurdity and is capricious in its humor, but at its root, the play celebrates maturity, hope and even family, however dysfunctional. And when these three peculiar siblings sit on the porch (and on the precipice of obscurity) listening to The Beatles’ “Here Comes The Sun” at the script’s conclusion, you can bet your bottom Ruble, they are each thinking of a rising sun, and not a setting one.

“Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike” will sell out so get your tickets today. Shows continue Fridays and Saturdays at 7:30pm and Sundays at 2:30 p.m., through Nov. 22 at 35 Below, 35 East Walnut St. in Asheville. Tickets are $20. Call the Asheville Community Theatre box office at (828) 254-1320, or visit ashevilletheatre.org.

Sandy Staggs, a Spartanburg native, is Drama Critic and Publisher of Carolina Curtain Call and has been a journalist and arts critic for 20 years with staff positions and/or articles in the San Francisco Examiner, Greenville News, Spartanburg Herald-Journal, San Francisco Bay Guardian, San Francisco Observer, Oakland Tribune, San Mateo County Times and more, as well as an essay in the Hub City Press book “Stars Fell on Spartanburg.”