An incandescent performance by Sophie Rundle is the high point of this luxuriant revival for Gorky’s sprawling classic
6 / 10
nd of course Chekhov is the melancholically amusing elephant in the bittersweet room here. His plays about the same sort of people set in the same sort of time are so deathlessly popular – not to mention, good – that it’s hard not to compare and contrast. Summerfolk is a fine play but it’s the moments where this production feels less like Chekhov – when it’s broader or angrier – that it really distinguishes itself. Still, history suggests we’re looking at something like a 25-year gap until it gets staged again. So this is a generational production, really, and whatever its flaws are, they shouldn’t put you off seeing the sort of luxury revival that the NT was made for.
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