Writer: Anton Chekhov
Director: Benedict Andrews
Well, the Donmar promised a radical interpretation of The Cherry Orchard and, for good and for bad, that’s what we’ve got. This Chekhov isn’t cosy and elegiac: instead, it’s angry and raw.
Earlier this year, Trevor Nunn plumped for a traditional telling of Chekhov in his production of Uncle Vanya for the Orange Tree Theatre, itself a riposte to Andrew Scott’s one-man Vanya. Benedict Andrews’ Cherry Orchard couldn’t be more different. Played under bright lights in the round on a bare platform, the cast, dressed in 21st century clothes and speaking in 21st century idioms, often drags audience members onto the stage. Chekhov will be turning in his grave.
The reason behind Andrews’ decision to involve the audience in this way – one unlucky ‘volunteer’ must pretend to be a bookcase – is unclear. The strategy brings awkward laughs but nothing else. There’s no sense in making us complicit in the downfall of prodigal aristocracy or in the rise of coarse bourgeoisie. However, the updated language, even though it relies on easy sniggers from swear words, strives to make the 1904 drama more contemporary.
Adeel Akhtar as the smart but ruthless Lopakhin, is like a contestant from The Apprentice, a rough diamond who Lord Sugar would surely champion. His vocabulary – “ Get a wiggle on”, “See ya, wouldn’t want to be ya” – would be perfect for reality TV. He swaggers with newfound power. Varya is lucky that he never proposes. Likewise, Nathan Armarkwei Laryea’s Yasha, in his gaudy tracksuit and matching slides, would be perfect in an episode of Towie.
Only Nina Hoss, in her London debut, seems familiar to the world of Chekhov. Her Liubov Ranevskaya is authentic, giving money that she doesn’t have to other landowners like Boris or to the homeless, here a boy who sings plaintively after that strange sound that symbolises the death knell of the aristocracy of Russia. Hoss would be the perfect tragic heroine in a more conventional Cherry Orchard.
Andrews’ strangest choice, however, is to turn the third act into a piece of gig theatre where the characters take part in an open-mic night. Yasha sings, Boris does some stand-up while Charlotta (Sarah Amankwah) performs some pretty mediocre magic tricks. The three-man band comes onto the stage while the actors swirl around with a portable dry ice machine as if it’s a 1960s’ happening. It’s all very messy and a little bit dull; a party at the end of the night when only the stragglers remain.
Through all of this staggers poor Firs, here gender-swapped for no reason, into an old woman, grumpily played by June Watson, in a crocheted cardigan, more asleep than awake. She fusses over her ward, Gaev (Michael Gould in an outfit that wouldn’t be out-of-place in 70s California), worrying that he hasn’t got the right coat on. At least, Firs’ final scene is in keeping with Chekhov’s tragic ending.
But in the rest of the play, the heart of the tragedy has been ripped out, very much like the fate of the cherry orchard itself. Daniel Monks, dependably good as always, is Trofimov, the moral compass of Chekhov’s examination of political and social change, who rails against inequality, but his revolutionary fervour is like that of an armchair social warrior, busy tweeting epigrams while never getting off their arse to put the ideas in action.
Everyone is unlikeable to the extent that the felling of the orchard comes as a relief, a just reward for this deluded community in which money means everything and nothing at all. Of course, every classic play is ripe for new readings (a few years ago, The Yard Theatre placed The Cherry Orchard on a spaceship) but Andrews has quite literally pulled the rug from out beneath us. And what’s left is empty and passionless.
Runs until 22 June 2024
The Reviews Hub Score
Radical retelling
