Three Sisters

Synopsis

Stranded in a remote provincial town, three sisters dream of returning to the Moscow of their youth. When a military garrison arrives nearby,the officers become their guests and suddenly a new life seems to be within reach. Liaisons develop, love is in the air and hopes run high - but the sisters reckon without the weakness of their brother, the grasping ambitions of his wife, and the strange eccentricities of a certain lieutenant. An explosion is brewing and matters come to a head on a frantic night of fire.

Our Review:

22 September 2008

If it’s Russia’s provincial navel-glazing classes, yearning for a better life in Moscow, it must be Chekhov. This translation (by Michael Frayn) of Three Sisters is a solid, meticulous start to the new Royal Exchange season, even if it does at times feel like the theatrical equivalent of bran flakes; in that, yes it’s good for you, but it has longeurs and isn’t the greatest of Chekhov’s plays. That said, it’s an immaculate production, and contains some truly beautiful moments.

In an un-named provincial Russian town, a year after the death of their father, three sisters, Olga (Lucy Black), Masha (Emma Cunniffe) and Irina (Beth Cooke) spend their days remembering their cosmopolitan Moscow upbringing, and yearning for a return to their fabled capital. Their brother, Andrey (Joseph Kloska), meanwhile, falls in love with the wily Natasha (Polly Findlay) and spirals into gambling debts. Over the course of the play, the mercurial shift of relationshi...

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