In a busy New York summer, it’s a Chekhov play that burns hottest

NEW YORK — “Intimate” is the go-to description for theater in small spaces these days. The term has even entered the help-wanted lexicon, defining the role of a production’s intimacy director, who ensures that close contact between actors is accomplished with physical and emotional safety.

But it also remains the best adjective to convey the enticing proximity of a show that allows an audience to feel it is breathing the actors’ air and eavesdropping on their whispers. It was that sense of connection that came across hearteningly as I and 39 other lucky patrons sat in a Manhattan loft for an evening in Anton Chekhov’s den of disillusionment, “Uncle Vanya.”