STAGE

Eugene O’Neill’s classic “Desire Under the Elms” --the first play directed by an American (Mark Lamos) in the Soviet Union--played to a sold-out audience on a Moscow stage Wednesday night. Lamos, artistic director of the Hartford Stage Company of Connecticut, received a standing ovation. The 870 people at the performance applauded politely in rhythm for the Soviet actors, and then rose to applaud energetically for Lamos. Several Soviets in the audience told Reuters they found the language in Lamos’ version--newly translated into Russian--too crude. The play, first performed by Moscow’s Pushkin Theater Company in 1926, was chosen by the company’s present artistic director, Yuri Yeremin, as an appropriate way to celebrate the centennial of O’Neill’s 1888 birth.