At the Ballet: Edgar Degas is seduced by the dance, but we’re unmoved by 'The Seduction of Edgar Degas'

Featuring a welter of different accents, acting styles, and direction by playwright Le Wilhelm that makes a hash out of the script, The Seduction of Edgar Degas feels frustratingly incomplete, despite some fine performances and a fascinating look at the artistic process.

The trouble begins early (at least with Cast A; there is also an alternate cast), when the decidedly twentieth-century Colleen Summa and Gabrielle Rosen scamper on stage as Marie-Auguste and Copine, respectively. Trading gossipy stories and giggles, they both seem more suited to dialogue as NYC gossip girls than 19th-century ballerinas, despite their slippers. But when the sturdy Mark A. Kinch strides in as painter Edgar Degas, hoping to paint one of the leading dancers, a small sigh of relief escapes. He handles the dialogue with ease, and compromises on the time and place by clearly enunciating with a hint of a British accent. Alas, soon joining him in the scene is Tony White, playing the girls’ backstage confidante Petit Pois as a mincing, swishing gay man straight out of a Tyler Perry movie. And from then on, it’s every man for himself as Degas and the celebrated dancer Eugénie Fiocre (a merry and appealing Kristin Carter) thrust and parry their way through their sittings, she alternately pouting and laughing, and he switching from charmed to snarling.

The long, dull first act serves mainly as exposition, as Degas finds himself drawn more and more to the backstage intrigues and the world of the dancers. The leaden proceedings quicken only when Carter and Kirsten Walsh—as the dragon lady in charge of the dancers—appear on stage. But the second act picks up considerably, as conflict after conflict pile onto one another; Wilhelm would have done well to move some of the crises into the first act for a stronger curtain, instead of relying so much on the friction between Fiocre and Degas. And though Degas is refreshingly period-correct in his patronizing views towards women (much to Fiocre’s horrified amusement), Kinch too often roars his lines when a steely menace would have been more welcome, especially in such a small space.

But if the first act is ultimately disappointing, the second act features some fine work from both Wilhelm and the actors. Lauren Ford, as the young dancer Cleo, does some particularly fine things with her angelic ballerina. So pure and good that she’s immediately marked for tragedy, Ford never overdoes the pathos or simpering sweetness of Cleo, quietly delivering her lines and filling in the blanks with her expressive eyes. But it’s Carter that you’ll leave remembering. Never once does she turn Fiocre into a caricature of a demanding diva. Instead, she remains perpetually bemused at the fuss and attention she receives, lashing out only when cornered by Degas. She and Ford both make it clear why Degas, who’d never painted dancers before, should find them so bewitching. If only the play itself had done a better job of showing that moment of seduction.

[ Thru Sept. 9. 59E59 Theatres, 59 E. 59th St. (betw. Madison and Park Aves.), 212-279-4200; $20.]