Anton Chekhov News

'We are beyond excited to announce our 20th anniversary season, and our fourth at 533 Sutter Street,' beams Brian Katz, Artistic Director of Custom Made Theatre Company.

Apollinaire Theatre Company presents the US Premiere of this viciously funny and unforgettable play about first love, teenage lust, and nature vs nurture.

Chekhov's classic comedy set in Knox County with unforgettable characters... fits Maine like a moose in a meadow! An ancestral farm with a unique cherry orchard in mid-coast Maine is about to be auctioned off for tax debt, and the soon-to-be-displaced family and their friends are at loggerheads as to what to do - Develop the land? Abandon the property? Throw a party and forget about it? Twelve unforgettable characters come together to determine the fate of the cherry orchard, and in the process, find out where they fit - or don't fit - in the changing face of Maine.

Black Theatre Troupe announces its final production of the 2017/18 Season, THREE SISTAHS.  (Please note this is a change in production, NOT a change in schedule.  Three Sistahs replaces Blackberry Daze which was previously announced.)

Check out the official trailer for Sony Pictures Classics' film adaptation of Anton Chekhov's THE SEAGULL, set to be released in May 2018. The film is directed by Tony winner Michael Mayer and adapted for the screen by Tony winner Stephen Karam. The Seagull is fresh and modern and as relevant now as when it was first produced in 1903 Russia. It is the story of eight people, all of whom are fatally in love with the wrong person.

Utopia Theatre Project is concluding their inaugural season with the world premiere of Seeds. This original work by a new Bay Area playwright explores the contemporary themes of sexual identity, masculinity, and sexual assault, all through the lens of World War II. Seeds was previously performed in 2016 as a Staged Reading at PianoFight and in the New Playwrights' Festival at Santa Clara University.

Transferring directly from the White Bear Theatre, where it has received widespread excellent critical coverage, The Lady with a Dog heads for the Tabard Theatre. Anton Chekhov's short story is adapted by writer/director Mark Giesser for the stage in a Jazz Age reimagining of this bittersweet romantic comedy, starring Beth Burrows (Sirens of the Silver Screen, Upstairs at the Gatehouse).

Black Box PAC announces the addition of a staged reading series to our 2018 season! LOW LIGHTS: A Staged Reading Series will showcase a variety of plays; from the classics you love to the contemporaries you didn't catch on Broadway. LOW LIGHTS will bring these stories, read by NJ and NYC professionals, to you at our home base in Teaneck, NJ.

Central Works 2018 season of new plays leaps into the spring with the world premiere of Palace Wreckers, Inc, written and directed by Gary Graves, opening with a press night on Saturday, May 12, and running through June 10  (previews May 10 & 11) in architect Julia Morgan's historic Berkeley City Club. This Central Works Method play is a 'revenge comedy' - based on a Greek tragedy, turned into a contemporary comedy.

Austin Shakespeare known predominantly for their love of the renaissance, jumps to the turn of the century Russian dramatist, Anton Chekhov, for his beloved play THE SEAGULL. Set aside a lake, our cast of characters desperately seek happiness despite the tragedy that befalls them during the play. Beginning with a play within a play, Konstantin (played by Andrew Matthews) is pining over his latest production and his love of the Russian countryside girl next store, Nina (play by Corinna Browning). Plagued by uncertainty, Konstantin debuts his original work to his family and house workers to receive mixed reviews from the onlookers and nasty commentary from his actress mother, Irina (played by Tyler Layton). Presenting all the relationships at once in the lakeside audience of Konstantin's play, all members seem to have mixed intentions with each other, with a majority of the characters loving the wrong person. Nina, the Russian countryside girl next door, ends up falling in love with a famous novelist Trigorin (played by Matt Radford Davies) attached to Irina, Konstantin's mother. Within the premise of love and ego, Austin Shakespeare brilliantly found Chekhov's comedy within character relationship and premise. The tragedy that unravels offstage to our cast of characters is equally as heart-breaking when reflecting on the hope our characters began with.

Classics are classics because they have a resonance that lasts long after their final word has been written.  The Old Globe's production of UNCLE VANYA, by Anton Chekhov, with a new translation by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky with playwright and production director Richard Nelson, is nothing short of an excellent example of letting a classic have its vibrant say once again.

I AM A SEAGULL, a new film directed by Brian Mertes, will have its world premiere at the Fourth Annual Segal Center Film Festival on Theatre and Performance (FTP) on Friday, March 2 at 6:30 PM. The screening, which is free and open to the public, will take place at The Martin E. Segal Theatre Center, located at Elebash Recital Hall at The Graduate Center, City University of New York (365 Fifth Avenue at 34th Street). The screening will be followed by a talkback featuring members of the creative team including creative producers Melissa Kievman and Alex Harvey, and producers Wendy Vanden Heuvel and Julie Buck.

Yale Repertory Theatre (James Bundy, Artistic Director; Victoria Nolan, Managing Director) presents Father Comes Home From the Wars, Parts 1, 2 & 3 by Suzan-Lori Parks, directed by Liz Diamond, March 16-April 7, at the University Theatre (222 York Street). Opening Night is Thursday, March 22. Father Comes Home From the Wars, Parts 1, 2 & 3 is a co-production with San Francisco's American Conservatory Theater, where it will play April 25-May 20.

Syracuse University's Department of Drama tackles a seminal work of modern Russian theater as it presents "The Seagull" by Anton Chekhov. First performed In St. Petersburg in 1896, "The Seagull" famously flopped on its opening night and nearly drove Chekhov to abandon playwriting. In 1898, the famous director Konstantin Stanislavsky staged the play at The Moscow Art Theatre where it proved a resounding success and helped establish the company's and the playwright's reputations.

La MaMa, in association with The Assembly, presents the world premiere of SEAGULLMACHINE, created by The Assembly, conceived by Nick Benacerraf, co-directed by Jess Chayes (Lucille Lortel Award winner) and Nick Benacerraf, and text by Anton Chekhov, Heiner Muller and The Assembly. SEAGULLMACHINE runs from April 14 - 29, 2018 in a limited engagement at La MaMa's Ellen Stewart Theatre, located at 66 East 4th Street between 2nd Avenue and the Bowery in New York City. Previews begin April 14 for an April 16 opening.

Reviews have poured in extolling the clever juxtaposition of Anton Chekhov's prose with Cole Porter's music & lyrics in MR. CHEKHOV & MR. PORTER. The triumvirate of talent behind this marriage of masters is Janet Bentley as director; Andy Evan Cohen as musical director, and Madeline Jaye as choreographer.  

BroadwayWorld has just learned that Sony Pictures Classics' film adaptation of Anton Chekhov's THE SEAGULL, is set to be released in May 2018. The film is directed by Tony winner Michael Mayer and adapted for the screen by Tony winner Stephen Karam. The Seagull is fresh and modern and as relevant now as when it was first produced in 1903 Russia. It is the story of eight people, all of whom are fatally in love with the wrong person.

Puerto Rico's acclaimed Casa Cruz de la Luna Theatre Company and INTAR Theatre will present The Marquis de Sade is Afraid of the Sea, as part of INTAR Theatre's NewWorks Lab.  Performances will be Friday, February 23rd at 8PM, Saturday, February 24th at 8PM, and Sunday, February 25th at 4PM at INTAR Theatre, 500 West 52nd Street at 10th Avenue.  Tickets are available for $5  and may be purchased at intartheatre.org or by calling 212-352-3101.  Please note: production contains explicit adult content and nudity.

LA's own Impro Theatre continues their residency at The Edye at The Broad Stage, presenting a different style of their signature improvisation for one weekend, each month.  February brings Chekhov UnScripted. For each performance Impro will create a full-length play, in the style of the great Russian master.  Starting with audience suggestions, each performance will feature characters dreaming of a different life, all the while dealing with the everyday unpredictability of feeling love, disillusionment and the certain catastrophe that is the comedy of life! LA Weekly called Chekhov UnScripted a "Pick of the Week," adding, "You don't have to be a Chekhov aficionado to appreciate this entertaining and clever mock-up of his art."

The Old Globe will present a free, one-night-only event, Barry Edelstein In Conversation with Richard Nelson, Richard Pevear, and Larissa Volokhonsky, supported by the Fuson Family, on Wednesday, February 14 at 5:30 p.m. Continuing his very popular interview series, Edelstein sits down with translator/director Nelson-a great American playwright, at once a poet of the stage and an innovator of theatrical form-and Pevear and Volokhonsky-the world's foremost translators of Russian literature, and perhaps our most influential thinkers about the art of translation. They will discuss the collaborative process behind this Uncle Vanya, as well as the art of translation and bringing the classics of the stage to life for a contemporary audience.