The Seagull

Written in 1896 this is a comic play of aspiration and failure. On a summer’s day in a makeshift theatre by a lake, a bold new play is to be performed. It is the work of a young, would-be playwright, Konstantin, who is searching for a new, more authentic dramatic form. The play stars his beautiful muse and neighbour, Nina. The assembled family audience includes his actress mother, Arkadina, who has just arrived from Moscow with the famous novelist, Trigorin. What happens during, and in the days immediately after, this play’s first performance will change not just the course of the summer, but the lives of everyone involved, for ever after. This masterly meditation on love and art is both comic and tragic, and marks the birth of the modern stage.

The ‘Bright Young Things’ have changed the mood in town fuelled by the boom of jazz, fashion and the arts, but on an estate in the country there is only a lake, and the people around it burn for something more… On a summer’s day in a makeshift theatre by a lake, a bold new play is to be performed. What happens during, and in the days immediately after, this performance will change not just the course of the summer, but the lives of everyone involved, for ever after. Luke Adamson’s adaptation of Chekhov’s masterly meditation on love and art relocates the action to roaring 1920’s Britain and will feature students making their debut on the professional stage following the closure of ALRA