Theater Analysis by Carol Rocamora . . .
When multiple revivals of the same classic dominate our stages in successive seasons, one can’t help but ask, as we’re now tempted to do: “Why this particular masterwork? Why now?”
In London and New York, two high-profile revivals of Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya attracted audiences and critics in the 2023-24 season. This past fall featured an arresting version called Vanya at the Duke of York Theatre in the West End, with Andrew Scott giving an astonishing solo performance playing all eight characters. This past spring at Lincoln Center, director Lila Neugebauer assembled an all-star cast, featuring Steve Carell in the title role, with Alfred Molina as the professor and Allison Pill as Sonya. They both followed an off-Broadway production of Uncle Vanya with another starry cast performing in a private loft in Manhattan’s Flatiron District, directed by Jack Serio, with David Cromer as Vanya, Will Brill as Astrov, and Marin Ireland as Sonya.
Looking ahead at the 2024-2025 season, Uncle Vanya will still be with us. Andrew Scott’s tour de force Vanya will be streaming on the National Theatre Live website (www.ntathome.com) for all to marvel at, beginning this September. The celebrity-Vanya trend will continue at the Shakespeare Theatre Company in Washington DC, starring Hugh Bonneville (of “Downton Abbey” fame), in the spring of 2025.
So why Uncle Vanya? And why now? Chekhov wrote four great plays (among his seven full-lengths)—so, why this particular one?
As a Chekhov translator and biographer, my observation over the years has been that Uncle Vanya is frequently adapted for the simple reason that it has the smallest cast among his “famous four,” and the simplest production requirements (one location, one outdoor scene, three indoor scenes). As his “tightest” play, it can be performed in spaces that highlight its intimacy—as director Andre Gregory did, for example, with Vanya on 42nd Street (1994) adapted by David Mamet and starring Wallace Shawn. It began as a weekly reading in a tiny rehearsal room on 42nd Street (audience by invitation only) and then moved to the abandoned, dilapidated New Amsterdam Theatre (also on 42nd Street). Gregory maintained the rehearsal ritual as his directorial concept, highlighting the sense of isolation and stasis in those vast, crumbling surroundings, reflecting the time and place in which Chekhov wrote the play. Similarly, Jack Serio’s Uncle Vanya in the Flatiron loft last summer accommodated only 40 audience members. As for past revivals, I’ll never forget the power of the Uncle Vanya I saw at the tiny Theatre on the Balustrade in Prague in 2000—directed by Petr Lebl—a space that seats only 60.
(In contrast, the Uncle Vanya at Lincoln Center emphasized the vastness of the Vivian Beaumont Theatre with a towering scenic design by Mimi Lien, set in a remote, undefined, present-day location. Impressive and commanding, it nonetheless tended to overpower and diminish the ensemble in a way that ultimately worked against Chekhov’s vision.)
Speaking of the cast, the richness of the characters in its small ensemble is the second reason for Vanya’s frequent revival. The roles provide starry casting opportunities. So many “greats” have played the title role—David Warner, Derek Jacobi, Tom Courtenay, Ian McKellen, Wallace Shawn, and Anthony Hopkins, to name only a few. This season, Andrew Scott dazzled audiences by playing not only Uncle Vanya but all the other roles as well, including the female ones. Rather than a theatrical stunt, it proved to be a stunning—indeed, an Olympics-level—tour de force in acting. I watched his performance in utter awe and admiration as he exercised full command, providing each role with specific vocal and behavioral features, as well as credibility. Of particular note were his interpretations of Vanya and Astrov, whose relationship is central to Chekhov’s play. How he managed to convey their friendship, while playing both parts, is truly remarkable.
It’s significant to note that Uncle Vanya is a rewrite of a previously failed Chekhov play called The Wood Demon. He rewrote it in 1896-97 when he was actually living the roles of both Vanya (a landowner in the countryside) and Astrov (a doctor). Scott was able to play these two sides of Chekhov masterfully, as well as project the depth of their friendship. As a result, miraculously, the actor himself personified Chekhov’s dual identity.
As for the other Vanyas this season, Steve Carell, a masterful comedic actor, offered a surprisingly low-key presence in the first two acts of the Lincoln Center revival, but ultimately delved into the tragic side of the role, especially in Act III’s explosive scene when he loses control and lashes out against the ensemble, lamenting his failed life. Although his Astrov (William Jackson Harper) received praise for his performance, the depth of their symbiotic relationship wasn’t fully explored. It will be interesting to see how Hugh Bonneville—an actor of elegance, style, and master of “the light touch”—will dig deeply into the darker side of the role, as Carell strove to do. (Regrettably, I did not see David Cromer’s Vanya at the Flatiron loft.)
The third reason for Uncle Vanya’s frequent revival is, of course, the universality of its themes—namely, identity, isolation, and the passage of time. In our post-COVID world, these themes resonate deeply. It has inspired directors to request new versions and adaptations that reflect the play’s relevance today . . . with varying success. This past season, I found Simon Stephen’s Vanya (the one with Andrew Scott) to be the most respectful of Chekhov’s original—although, in an attempt to express its modern context, Stephens’ versions occasionally included contemporary expletives (notably the “f-word”). That usage is jarring, simply for the reason that Chekhov’s language is utterly free of any expletives. On the contrary, the original is both mellifluous and poetic, as well as colloquial (in its time). Therein lies its special beauty. Unfortunately, Heidi Schreck’s modernized version in the LCT production also indulged the use of too many different expletives, to the point that they became the dominant feature of her text. As a translator of Chekhov’s plays from the Russian original to the English, I believe that the beauty of his language is essential to the integrity of the play. As Beckett said, “Writing is not about something. It is something.”
Finally, there is the question: are these updated versions “Chekhovian”? And what does that mean, anyway? I think its meaning lies in his unique vision of the inexorable passage of time. Chekhov was a doctor, who knew his life would be short. He suffered his first lung hemorrhage at 24, was diagnosed with consumption at 37—the year he wrote Uncle Vanya—and died at 44. As such, he felt the passage of time even more keenly once he moved to the countryside (Uncle Vanya’s subtitle is “Scenes From Country Life”). Chekhov’s short life spanned four decades of the most precipitous and dramatic changes in Russian history. Born in 1860, the year before the emancipation of the serfs (81% of the population), he died in 1904, the year before the first Russian revolution. Chekhov felt his country’s decline keenly. “This Russia of ours is an absurd, clumsy country,” he once wrote.
For a modernized version to be truly “Chekhovian,” it needs to express this essential vision of time. While Andrew Scott’s Vanya is remarkable, it’s more about the performance than the play. While Lila Gebauer’s Uncle Vanya at LCT was beautifully directed, designed, and acted, its setting in a kind of no man’s land deprived the audience of the opportunity to discover the connection between Chekhov’s times and today for themselves.
Still, we reach for Chekhov with every passing theater season, just as Chekhov himself reached for the vision of a future he knew he would not live to witness. “I will not see it,” he wrote, “ but others will.”
Vanya, by Anton Chekhov, in a version by Simon Stephens. The National Theatre production begins streaming September 19 at National Theatre at Home (www.ntathome.com).
Uncle Vanya, by Anton Chekhov, adapted by Conor McPherson/ Shakespeare Theatre Company, Washington DC, March 30-April 20, 2025.
Uncle Vanya, by Anton Chekhov, in a version by Heidi Schreck, directed by Lila Neugebauer, played at Lincoln Center Theater April-June, 2024.
Cover Photo: Full cast and set of Lincoln Center Theater’s “Uncle Vanya,” Spring 2024 (Photo: Marc J. Franklin)