Russia’s top actors will headline the West End transfer of Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya and Three Sisters. Directed by Andrei Konchalovsky, the plays will run in repertory April 23 through May 3 at the Wyndham’s Theatre, with opening night set for April 24. They were originally produced at Moscow’s renowned Mossovet State Academic Theatre.
The plays with be performed in their original Russian with English subtitles. The cast includes Aleksandr Domogarov, Julia Vysotskaya, Pavel Derevyanko, Aleksandr Filippenko, Vladas Bagdonas, Natalia Vdovina, Alksandr Bobrovsky, Larisa Kuznetsova, Galina Bob, Aleksey Grishin,Vitaly Kishchenko.
Uncle Vanya is set on a dilapidated, remote farm. Uncle Vanya and his niece Sonya have worked slavishly for years to sustain an estate in decline. Now Professor Serebryakov and his wife Yelena have returned to visit, bringing with them chaos and disruption. Constant visits from the charismatic Astrov are not helpful. Lunch is no longer served at lunchtime—now it is procrastinated until dusk—work is forgotten and the long, cool nights have become sleepless. From this hotbed of disarray grow three consuming love affairs, each of which is destined to wither in disappointment before it has reached bloom. It is in this climate of frustration and thwarted hopes that the Professor chooses to announce a shocking plan.
In Three Sisters the Prozorov family, frustrated by their small-town life, long to return to Moscow. But as relationships, duty and misguided optimism take hold, the family find their dreams drifting further away.