Family drama is a long slog

The current revival of Beth Henley's Crimes of the Heart at McCarter Theatre is a nearly three-hour-long sitcom - with lots of sit, very little com. Why anybody thought this dated, contrived, and predictable play needed to be seen again is beyond me.

There are three sisters (what?? A Chekhov riff? Dream on.). Lenny (Mary Bacon) is the oldest sister; she is dutiful, plain, lonely, and exploited by the others. Meg (Georgia Cohen) is the middle sister; she is sexy and selfish. Babe (Molly Camp) is the youngest sister; she is childish, silly, and under arrest for having shot her husband with intent to kill. Enter Barnette Lloyd (Dustin Ingram), a young lawyer who will save the day.

But never mind the murder charge, never mind their mother's suicide, never mind Babe's affair with a 15-year-old boy who happens to be black (this is 1974 in a small town in Mississippi). And while you're never minding, never mind that Doc Porter (Lucas Van Engen) walks with a limp because Meg, his girlfriend five years before, abandoned him, injured, in a collapsed building during Hurricane Camille.

And never mind that Grandpa is in the hospital, having had another stroke. Or that the lawyer's father's life was ruined by Babe's husband. Or that the only person who remembered Lenny's birthday is their cousin Chick (Brenda Withers), who gives her a box of chocolates, left over from Christmas, which Meg will then eat. Or that her beloved horse is struck by lightning and killed. These are merely situations - nothing to worry about, since this is supposedly a comedy, although the Princeton audience seemed unamused, which is no surprise.

The set (designed by Andromache Chalfant), as is typical of McCarter productions, is lavish in detail and authenticity: a kitchen with turquoise cabinets and mustard-colored appliances, a pink clapboard house exterior, complete with every architectural feature just so we can see the light go on in an upstairs bedroom once.

Directed by Liesl Tommy with the heaviest of hands, everyone (except Dustin Ingram playing the lawyer) acts his or her role so broadly, so loudly, so cartoonishly that there is no chance we'll care about any of these characters. Except maybe their dead mother, who was "having a really bad day." She's not the only one.

McCarter Theatre, 90 University Place, Princeton. Through March 27. Tickets $20-$70. Information: 609-258-2787, 888-278-7932, or www.mccarter.org.EndText