Alexis
Soloski

July 27, 2015

Helen Keller had a brief stage career. This might sound like a joke. It isn’t. In the 1920s, she toured the vaudeville circuit with Annie Sullivan, swanning around in sequined dresses while demonstrating her accomplishments and cracking jokes about drink and politics. A New York Times review effused, “Helen Keller has conquered again.” Many decades after that triumph, Keller is onstage again in the Transport Group’s often moving, sometimes sudsy, sometimes dull “Three Days to See,” a play drawn from Keller’s writing and speeches. The director Jack Cummings III has culled nearly two hours of observations and anecdotes and assigned them to a cast of seven animated actors. These performers — a grab bag of age, race, gender and height — all play Keller, occasionally wearing a pinafore. While there is much discussion of Sullivan’s teaching methods, there’s not a lot in “Three Days to See” that will make you think of “The Miracle Worker.” Sure, there are occasional bouts of earnestness, but much of the material is playful and even peppy, with passages set to an unimaginative assortment of show tune instrumentals and classical jingles.