What's+With+the+Smiles?

Throughout the play Yelena always seemed to be smiling. Even when she burst into tears she was still smiling. Throughout the whole play there are very few moments where she is not smiling to some extent and she also seems to be the charcter that laughs the most. Why is this? It is obvious from the comments that she has made that she is just as depressed as the rest of them are. She has no purpose no meaning in life yet she is always smiling. Is this just the way the actor is and thus not indicative to the play? or is the charcter meant to be like that, on the inside just as sorrowful as the rest yet on the ouside always smiling. If it was meant to be in the play then why is she supposed to be always smiling? Is it the fact that because she is young she thinks that despite what is happening aound her she could still try to find happiness or is it because she is trying to put on a brave face and try to lift the gloom outwardly at least when on the inside that seems to be all thats there. Or maybe it is just an actor with too much botox and I'm just interpreting her facial expression way too far. user:DGr-c

Haha... botox. Anyway, I noticed that Yelena always had a smile on her face. No matter what, even in those times of sorrow, she seemed to always want to show a smile. On those few occasions when she didn't smile, it felt as though something was missing. In the scene after the doctor kissed her and Vanya saw, for the rest of the scene she didn't smile at all. The play had sunk to an even more depressing mode. Personally I think that the character is supposed to act like this. Whenever I am hurt, twist my ankle, scrape my knee, etc. I always start to smile and laugh to try and hold back the tears. I try to not show my weak side and always try to laugh it off... but of course that never works. I think Yelena is trying to do the same thing. Her life is so topsy turvy. Her husband won't listen to the doctor, the doctor is kissing her, Vanya is in love with her, she has to tell Sonya that the doctor doesn't lover her... oh my gosh!!! Talk about drama!!! I think that Yelena has given up. She can't just sit and cry about it, so instead she has to smile and try to force herself to appear to be happy. She knows that when her smile disappears, everyone will start to question her and why she isn't happy. 1205451261

I also think it is definitely a trait the character is supposed to show. I don’t believe, even a bad actor, would unconsciously smile that much when playing a part. Because I believe it’s intentional, I think we should be able to figure out why this is the case. The biggest reason I see is that she is masking her emotions. Throughout the play she seems to be the one who has it together well and who is loved by everyone. People make comments about Yelena’s beauty, and clearly adore her. Maybe the fact that she always appears happy on the outside is partly why others are attracted to her and find beauty in her. Even if she is forcing it many times, at least she is confident and put together. 1205452951

I think that the smiley-ness is just a character tick that the actress has. Admittedly, her strange bouts of laughter made me rather annoyed at times during the movie, and made me think that she's not a very good actress. However, it made the story more true-to-life, as some people really react to situations that way. When people are nervous or upset, sometimes they laugh in spite of themselves. I don't know whether that is a personal trait of the actress or whether that's a trait she adopted for this particular character, as I don't think I've seen her in anything else before. Either way, whether I like it or not, I understand how it helped enhance her character.1205453094

The actress' smiles and laughs made me think the opposite of Nick's conclusion--I thought she was an incredibly dedicated and talented actress. First of all, I think it is safe to assume that, in having been a part of the rather talented group that put on this play, the actress was not so thoughtless and talentless that she would let a personal tick, like laughing or smiling, leak into a character she was playing. I say this because, though I don't know for sure, I would be willing to wager that such an actress has much experience and has proved her worth, and is conscious of every behavior she uses for her character.

Therefore, I think back over Yelena's dialogue, and I think it would be easy to play Yelena as a bland, or even slightly depressed character. Perhaps a less talented actress would take her words to mean that she really has no emotion about the world around her, and even the actress who thinks deeply enough to realize she is unsatisfied might try to work that in quite obviously by making her actions depressed and sluggish as a way of conveying her unhappiness. But the actress in the movie played the role in a thoughtful way--she understood that Yelena, though quite affected by her situation, would not want anyone to suspect it. Therefore, she played her in a smiley, laughy, forced way that pretended happiness, but was clearly, to the audience, a plea for help and a cover for her true feelings. I thought the actress was quite talented. 1205454484

Yelena's random smiles and random laughs could be a tribute to her irrationality, and possibility the irrationality of others. She is clearly stuck in an unhappy marriage with an old, pompous, retired scholar who enjoys insulting those who try to help him. But yet, she stays with this guy, even leaving behind her friends to be with him alone in Finland. Sick. Anyways, her irrationality or contradiction in character is also evident the many times that other men try to woo her or seduce her. With Uncle Vanya especially, she appears to give in initially to the wooing and seducing, but then, at one point she suddenly snaps and starts yelling at him. She is clearly a volatile character. Thus, it is no surprise that she has a smile on her face while she is crying near the end of the film.1205465552

Daniel and Tom, have you never met women like Yelena? That's their way of dealing with issues, it's not 'irrational' or 'contradicting'. Yelena is depressed at where her life has gone, but she is quite incapable of facing it, and has great difficulty telling herself something is wrong, much less showing that to others. Ok, when you have a problem, a serious one, what do you do? You avoid it? Pretend it's not there? Face it straight on in an almost too-direct manner? Or, like her, try to hide the ill by working around it with laughter or with something else? She acts like nothing's wrong to conceal that something is VERY wrong. When she feels pressured, as by Vanya, she laughs and acts like that because she cannot be stern towards him. She can't put pressure on others, or be mean. So that's why what the others are doing is terrible. She's a poor soul, incapable of standing up to others, who is passive, trying to forget her problems, and people just take advantage of her weakness to try to get her for her beauty. She laughs in the 'oh, silly you, you're acting naughty, haha' which really means 'please! stop, I can't take it! Don't do this to me, please! Please no!' and she covers it up with a smile and a laugh. Never judge people by their superficial actions, you might be very misled. 1205469428

I think what Yelena is doing is smiling through her pain. I found it just as annoying for her to all of a sudden smile for an apparently tragic reason--a bad choice on the part of the actor--but I can see the reasoning behind it. Yelena has been trapped in a loveless marriage and has been forced to bear many hardships in her relationships: the doctor's illness, the realization of her mistake, the submission to riding it out. The only she she can do to keep from killing herself is to literally put on a smile and grin and bear it. It may be a weak reaction to a situation that requires strong action, but Yelena is a weak, lazy, inactive character in the play--as the aristocracy usually is--so for her it is the strongest effort that she can muster to attempt to improve her situation. This also explains her crying at the end of the film with a smile on her face: she is trying to bear the pain that she feels by smiling, but such a weak effort is easily overcome by her emotions, and it is showing in this scene. 1205501586