The Stage

Uncle Vanya

It's Russian and it's Irish. It's Chekov and it's Friel. The elision of two theatrical traditions, two national cultures, two masters of drama is so seamlessly effected in this skilful reworking that it is difficult to distinguish where one ends and the other begins. Mick Gordon's carefully crafted, contemporary revival owes much of its impact to Igor Vasiljev's minimal, abstract design, a combination of white wooden chairs and sliding panels, which gradually distance the perspective of the surrounding, thickly wooded plantation and reflect the changing moods and colours of the seasons. The story unfolds of an affluent family in freefall, its estate disintegrating, its woodlands dwindling, its very survival threatened by the relentless demands of an encroaching outside world. Its themes are so reminiscent of Friel's finest plays that one almost forgets that its original version was premiered in Moscow in 1899. But old Russia is on show, too, in the ever present, highly polished samovar, the jingling bells on the departing troikas, the evocative names of the characters...

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