Jane Austen’s classic novel is a cautionary tale of the dangers of oversusceptibility to sentiment. Two sisters, self-possessed Elinor and self-dramatizing Marianne, negotiate misunderstandings, rivals, and other social pitfalls on their paths to the altar. Unreflective Marianne gets the worst of it. Jessica Martin plays her with an affecting grasp of the role’s pathos, easing up on the rigid judginess that can make the character, as Austen wrote her, a bit of a pill. Kjerstine Anderson movingly exhibits Elinor’s struggle to live up to the task of being the stable center around which everyone else revolves, a job she never asked for. Austen is by turns a satirist, an idealist, an ironist, and a realist so stark on the subjects of women and money that it’s long exposed her to accusations of snobbery. One thing she’s not is sentimental. Though a few of here juiciest jokes are omitted in this production, adapter Jen Taylor has neatly streamlined the involved plot, directed by Makaela Pollock. (Runs Wed.-Sun., see website for exact schedule. Ends June 26.) GAVIN BORCHERT

Wednesdays-Sundays. Starts: May 25. Continues through June 26, 2011