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''Three Sisters'' (russian: Три сeстры́, translit=Tri sestry) is a play by the Russian author and playwright Anton Chekhov. It was written in 1900 and first performed in 1901 at the Moscow Art Theatre. The play is sometimes included on the short list of Chekhov's outstanding plays, along with ''
The Cherry Orchard ''The Cherry Orchard'' (russian: Вишнёвый сад, translit=Vishnyovyi sad) is the last play by Russian playwright Anton Chekhov. Written in 1903, it was first published by ''Znaniye'' (Book Two, 1904), and came out as a separate edition ...
'', ''
The Seagull ''The Seagull'' ( rus, Ча́йка, r=Cháyka, links=no) is a play by Russian dramatist Anton Chekhov, written in 1895 and first produced in 1896. ''The Seagull'' is generally considered to be the first of his four major plays. It dramatises ...
'' and ''
Uncle Vanya ''Uncle Vanya'' ( rus, Дя́дя Ва́ня, r=Dyádya Ványa, p=ˈdʲædʲə ˈvanʲə) is a play by the Russian playwright Anton Chekhov. It was first published in 1898, and was first produced in 1899 by the Moscow Art Theatre under the dire ...
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Characters


The Prozorovs

* Olga Sergeyevna Prozorova (Olga) – The eldest of the three sisters, she is the matriarchal figure of the Prozorov family, though at the beginning of the play she is only 28 years old. Olga is a teacher at the high school, where she frequently fills in for the headmistress whenever the latter is absent. Olga is a spinster and at one point tells Irina that she would have married "any man, even an old man if he had asked" her. Olga is very motherly even to the elderly servants, keeping on the elderly nurse/retainer Anfisa, long after she has ceased to be useful. When Olga reluctantly takes the role of headmistress permanently, she takes Anfisa with her to escape the clutches of the heartless Natasha. * Maria Sergeyevna Kulygina (Masha) – The middle sister, she is 23 at the beginning of the play. She married her husband, Kulygin, when she was 18 and just out of school. When the play opens she has been disappointed in the marriage and falls completely in love with the idealistic Lieutenant-Colonel Vershinin. They begin a clandestine affair. When he is transferred away, she is crushed, but returns to life with her husband, who accepts her back despite knowing what she has done. She has a short temper, which is seen frequently throughout the play, and is the sister who disapproves the most of Natasha. Onstage, her directness often serves as a tonic to the melodrama, and her ironic wit comes across as heroic. She provides much of the humour. She was trained as a concert pianist. * Irina Sergeyevna Prozorova – The youngest sister, she is 20 at the beginning of the play. It is her " name day" at the beginning of the play and though she insists she is grown-up she is still enchanted by things such as a spinning top brought to her by Fedotik. Her only desire is to go back to Moscow, which they left eleven years before the play begins. She believes she will find her true love in Moscow, but when it becomes clear that they are not going to Moscow, she agrees to marry the Baron Tuzenbach, whom she admires but does not love. She gets her teaching degree and plans to leave with the Baron, but he is shot and killed by the psychopath Solyony in a pointless duel. She decides to leave anyway and dedicate her life to work and service. * Andrei Sergeyevich Prozorov (Andrey) – The brother of the three sisters. In Act I, he is a young man on the fast track to becoming a faculty professor in Moscow. However, his inertia, weak-willed indecisiveness, and poor judgment (all of which will become apparent throughout the play) put paid to those dreams. In Act II, he still longs for his old days as a bachelor dreaming of life in Moscow, but is now, due to his fatefully ill-conceived wedding to Natasha, stuck in a provincial town with a baby and a job as secretary to the
County Council A county council is the elected administrative body governing an area known as a county. This term has slightly different meanings in different countries. Ireland The county councils created under British rule in 1899 continue to exist in Irel ...
. In Act III, his debts have grown to 35,000 rubles and he is forced to mortgage the house, but does not tell his sisters or give them any shares in the family home. Act IV finds Andrei a pathetic shell of his former self, now the father of two (although he may not be the biological father of the younger child). He acknowledges he is a failure and laughed at in town for being a member of the village council whose president, Protopopov (never seen onstage), is cuckolding him. * Natalia Ivanovna Prozorov (Natasha) – Andrei's love interest, later his wife. She begins the play as an awkward young woman who dresses poorly and is ridiculed and teased by Andrei's sisters. Much fun is made of her ill-becoming green sash and she bursts into tears. She ''apparently'' has no family of her own, although not known to be an orphan (a signal that she cares for no one but herself) and the reader never learns her maiden name. She agrees to marry Andrei despite seemingly being surprised by the proposal. Act II finds a very different Natasha. She has grown bossy and flagrantly carries on an affair with Protopopov, the president of the council on which her husband sits bureaucratic superior, and who may well be the biological father of her younger child, especially since she has bustled Andrei out of their bedroom into more modest quarters. In Act III, she has become even more controlling. She is determined, among other things, to expel the sisters' now elderly former family retainer, Anfisa, who is no longer fit for hard work, and still throws temper tantrums whenever she doesn't get her way, an increasingly rare event. Act IV finds that she has control of the house, and, as the châtelaine, is planning to radically change the grounds to her liking. Inarguably, she is the victor by the end of the play — caring for no one besides her own children, Bobik and Sofia, upon whom she dotes. The only woman in the play with children, she rules the Prozorov's now mortgaged (to pay for her husband's debts and her expensive tastes) former family home with an iron fist. She orders the trees on the property be cut down because they are ugly at night. * Fyodor Ilyich Kulygin – Masha's older husband and the Latin teacher at the high school. Kulygin is a jovial, kindly man, who truly loves his wife, and her sisters, although he is very much aware of her infidelity. In the first act he seems almost foolish, giving Irina a gift he has already given her, and joking around with the doctor to make fun of Natasha, but begins to grow more and more sympathetic as Masha's affair progresses. During the fire in Act 3, he confesses to Olga that he might have married her – the fact that the two would probably be very happy together is hinted at many times during the play. Throughout the play, often at the most serious moments, he often tries to make the other characters laugh in order to relieve tension, and while that doesn't always work, he is able to give his wife comfort through humour in her darkest hour at the climax of the play. At the end of the play, although knowing what Masha has done, he takes her back and accepts her failings.


The soldiers

* Aleksandr Ignatyevich Vershinin – Lieutenant colonel commanding the artillery battery, Vershinin is a true philosopher. He knew the girls' father in Moscow and they talk about how when they were little they called him the "Lovesick Major". In the course of the play, despite being married, he enters into an affair with Masha but must end it when the battery is transferred. He frequently mentions how his wife regularly attempts suicide (and he has two daughters), but he seems to not care. His first act speech about the hope he has for civilization speaks directly to Masha's melancholic heart, and, upon hearing it, she declares "I'm staying for lunch." * Baron Nikolaj Lvovich Tuzenbach – A lieutenant in the army and not deemed handsome, Tuzenbach often tries to impress Irina, whom he has loved for five years. He quits the Army to go to work in an attempt to impress her. He is repeatedly taunted by Solyony and between Acts III and IV, he retaliates and prompts Solyony to declare a duel. He is killed in the duel, thus his and Irina's union is forlorn. * Staff Captain Vassily Vasilyevich Solyony – A captain in the army, Solyony is a borderline psychotic social misfit and a rather modern type of antihero. Infatuated with Irina, he tries to put down the Baron to make himself look better, but Irina finds him crude and unappealing. He spends much of his time mocking the Baron, who is the closest thing he has to a friend, and ends up killing him in a pointless duel because he has sworn to kill any successful suitor for Irina even though he knows it will not win him her hand. (He has fought at least two previous duels, although the details and fates of his previous dueling opponents is not specified.) He claims to have a remarkable resemblance to the poet Lermontov in both face and personality, often quoting him, although Lermontov was killed in a duel by refusing to fire at his opponent, Nikolai Martynov, who aimed at Lermontov's heart. Thus, Solyony turns out to be the polar opposite of Lermontov in actual character and closer to Martynov. He always carries a small perfume bottle which he frequently (almost pathologically) sprinkles his hands and body with; it is later revealed that he does it to mask the smell of corpses on him. * Ivan Romanovich Chebutykin – Sixty years old and an army doctor, Chebutykin starts off as a fun, eccentric old man who exults in his place as family friend and lavishes upon Irina the expensive but inappropriate gift of a samovar. Later on in Act III, while drunk, he suffers an existential crisis and reveals to all about Natasha's and Protopopov's affair. In Act IV however, he seems to have come to terms with his crisis or perhaps been broken by it. He was in love, apparently unrequitedly, with the Prozorov siblings' mother, a married woman. * Alexei Petrovich Fedotik – A sub-lieutenant, Fedotik hangs around the house buying many gifts for the family. He also is an amateur photographer, and takes photos of the group. In Act III, he loses all his belongings in the fire, but retains his cheerful nature. * Vladimir Karlovich Rode – Another sub-lieutenant, Rode is a drill coach at the high school.


Others

* Ferapont – Door-keeper at the local council offices, Ferapont is an old man with a partial hearing loss. He repeatedly blurts out random facts, usually relating to Moscow. * Anfisa – An elderly family retainer and former nurse, Anfisa is 81 years old and has worked forever for the Prozorov family. Natasha begins to despise her for her feebleness and threatens to throw her out but Olga rescues her, taking her to live at Olga's teacher's flat.


Unseen characters

The play has several important characters who are talked about frequently, but never seen onstage. These include Protopopov, head of the local Council and Natasha's lover; Vershinin's suicidal wife and two daughters; Kulygin's beloved superior the headmaster of the high school, and Natasha's children (Bobik and Sofia). JL Styan contends in his ''The Elements of Drama'' that in the last act Chekhov revised the text to show that Protopopov is the real father of Sofia: "The children are to be tended by their respective fathers" — Andrey pushes Bobik in his pram, and Protopopov sits with Sofia.


Synopsis

Act one begins with Olga (the eldest sister) working as a schoolteacher but at the end of the play she is made headmistress, a position she had said she did not want. Masha, the middle sister and the artist of the family (she was trained as a concert pianist), is married to Feodor Ilyich Kulygin, a schoolteacher. At the time of their marriage, Masha, younger than he, was enchanted by what she took to be wisdom, but seven years later, she sees through his pedantry and his clownish attempts to compensate for the emptiness between them. Irina, the youngest sister, is still full of expectation. She speaks of her dream of going to Moscow and meeting her true love. It was in Moscow that the sisters grew up, and they all long to return to the sophistication and happiness of that time. Andrei is the only boy in the family and his sisters adore him. He falls in love with Natalia Ivanovna ("Natasha"), who is somewhat common in relation to the sisters and initially suffers under their glance. The play begins on the first anniversary of the death of their father, Sergei Prozorov. It is also Irina's
name-day In Christianity, a name day is a tradition in many countries of Europe and the Americas, among other parts of Christendom. It consists of celebrating a day of the year that is associated with one's baptismal name, which is normatively that of ...
, and everyone, including the soldiers (led by the gallant Vershinin) bringing with them a sense of noble
idealism In philosophy, the term idealism identifies and describes metaphysics, metaphysical perspectives which assert that reality is indistinguishable and inseparable from perception and understanding; that reality is a mental construct closely con ...
, comes together to celebrate it. At the very close of the act, Andrei exultantly confesses his feelings to Natasha in private and fatefully asks her to marry him. Act two begins almost a year later with Andrei and Natasha married with their first child (offstage), a baby boy named Bobik. Natasha is having an affair with Protopopov, Andrei's superior, a character who is mentioned but never seen onstage. Masha comes home flushed from a night out, and it is clear that she and her companion, Lieutenant-Colonel Vershinin, are giddy with the secret of their mutual love for one another. Natasha manipulatively quashes the plans for a party in the home; the resultant quiet suggests that all happiness is being quashed as well. Tuzenbach and Solyony both declare their love for Irina. Act three takes place about a year later in Olga and Irina's room, a clear sign that Natasha is taking over the household as she asked them to share rooms so that her child could have a different room. There has been a fire in the town, and, in the crisis, people are passing in and out of the room, carrying blankets and clothes to give aid. Olga, Masha and Irina are angry with their brother, Andrei, for mortgaging their home without their knowledge or consent, keeping the money to pay off his gambling debts and ceding all power over the household to his wife. However, when faced with Natasha's cruelty to their aged family retainer, Anfisa, Olga's own best efforts to stand up to Natasha come to naught. Masha, alone with her sisters, confides in them her romance with Vershinin ("I love, love, love that man."). At one point, Kulygin (Masha's husband) blunders into the room, doting ever more foolishly on her, and she stalks out. Irina despairs at the common turn her life has taken, the life of a municipal worker, even as she rails at the folly of her aspirations and her education. ("I can't remember the Italian for 'window'".) Out of her resignation, supported in this by Olga's realistic outlook, Irina decides to accept Tuzenbach's offer of marriage even though she does not love him. Chebutykin drunkenly stumbles and smashes a clock which had belonged to the Prozorov siblings' late mother, whom he loved. Andrei then vents his self-hatred, acknowledges his own awareness of life's folly and his disappointment in Natasha, and begs his sisters' forgiveness for everything. In the fourth and final act, outdoors behind the home, the soldiers are preparing to leave the area. A flash-photograph is taken. There is an undercurrent of tension because Solyony has challenged the Baron (Tuzenbach) to a duel over a flimsy pretext. Solyony had told Irina that he would kill any successful suitor for her hand but she still agreed to marry Tuzenbach, notwithstanding which she confesses that she cannot love him, likening her heart to a piano whose key has been lost. (Tuzenbach, having left the Army was under no obligation to agree to the duel but did so, anyway, losing his life for what would have been a loveless marriage.) As the soldiers are leaving, a shot is heard, and Tuzenbach's death in the duel is announced shortly before the end of the play. Masha has to be pulled, sobbing, from Vershinin's arms, but her husband willingly, compassionately, asks that they start again. Olga has reluctantly accepted the position of permanent headmistress of the school where she teaches and is moving out. She is taking Anfisa with her, thus rescuing the elderly woman from Natasha. Irina's fate is uncertain but, even in her grief at Tuzenbach's death, she wants to persevere in her work as a teacher. Natasha remains as the chatelaine, in charge and in control of everything. Andrei is stuck in his marriage with two children, unwilling and unable to do anything for his wife or himself. As the play closes, the three sisters stand in a desperate embrace, gazing off as the soldiers depart to the sound of a band's gay march. As Chebutykin sings '' Ta-ra-ra-boom-di-ay'' to himself,Contemporary audiences would have recognised this song, from 1892, as Chebutykin's ironic reference to the doomed affair between Masha and Vershinin — Olga's final lines call for an end to the confusion all three feel at life's sufferings and joy: "If we only knew... If we only knew."


Premiere

The play was written for the Moscow Art Theatre and it opened on 31 January 1901, under the direction of
Konstantin Stanislavski Konstantin Sergeyevich Stanislavski ( Alekseyev; russian: Константин Сергеевич Станиславский, p=kənstɐnʲˈtʲin sʲɪrˈgʲejɪvʲɪtɕ stənʲɪˈslafskʲɪj; 7 August 1938) was a seminal Soviet Russian th ...
and
Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko Vladimir Ivanovich Nemirovich-Danchenko (russian: Владимир Иванович Немирович-Данченко; , Ozurgeti – 25 April 1943, Moscow), was a Soviet and Russian theatre director, writer, pedagogue, playwright, producer a ...
. Stanislavski played Vershinin and the sisters were Olga Knipper (for whom Chekhov wrote the part of Masha),
Margarita Savitskaya Margarita Georgiyevna Savitskaya (russian: Маргарита Георгиевна Савицкая, born 30 October 1868, — died 27 March 1911) was a Russian stage actress and in her later years a reader in drama, associated with the Moscow Art ...
as Olga and Maria Andreyeva as Irina.
Maria Lilina Maria Petrovna Alexeyeva (russian: Мари́я Петро́вна Алексе́ева, Perevoshchikova, Перево́щикова, 21 June 1866 - 24 August 1943) was a Russian stage actress, associated with the Moscow Art Theatre, better kno ...
(Stanislavski's wife) was Natasha, Vsevolod Meyerhold appeared as Tusenbach, Mikhail Gromov as Solyony,According to N. Efros Leonid Leonidov played Solyony. He took up this part indeed, but only after 1903, when he joined Moscow Art Theatre. Coincidentally, Leonidov did play Solyony during the 1900/1901 season too, but as part of the Odessa-based Solovtsov Troupe.
Leonodov's biography
at the Moscow Art Theatre site.
Alexander Artyom Alexander Rodionovich Artemyev (russian: Александр Родионович Артемьев; 1842 – 16 May 1914) was a Russian stage actor, associated with Moscow Art Theatre and better known under his stage name Artyom (Артём). Li ...
as Artem Chebutykin, Ioasaf Tikhomirov as Fedotik,
Ivan Moskvin Ivan Mikhailovich Moskvin (russian: Иван Михайлович Москвин; 18 June 1874, in Moscow – 16 February 1946, in Moscow) was a Russian and Soviet actor and theater director. People's Artist of the USSR (1936). He became director ...
as Rode, Vladimir Gribunin as Ferapont, and Maria Samarova as Anfisa. Reception was mixed. Chekhov felt that Stanislavski's "exuberant" direction had masked the subtleties of the work and that only Knipper had shown her character developing in the manner the playwright had intended. In the directors' view, the point was to show the hopes, aspirations and dreams of the characters, but audiences were affected by the pathos of the sisters' loneliness and desperation and by their eventual, uncomplaining acceptance of their situation. Nonetheless the piece proved popular and soon it became established in the company's repertoire.


Notable productions

* John Gielgud's 1936–37 landmark season at the Queen's Theatre included a well-received production with Peggy Ashcroft as Irina and Michael Redgrave as Tusenbach. * In 1942, Judith Anderson portrayed Olga, Katharine Cornell portrayed Masha, Gertrude Musgrove portrayed Irina, and Ruth Gordon portrayed Natasha on Broadway. The production was significant enough to land the cast on the cover of ''
Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, t ...
'' on 21 December 1942, which proclaimed it "a dream production by anybody's reckoning – the most glittering cast the theatre has seen, commercially, in this generation". * The 1963 inaugural season of the Guthrie Theater included a production with Jessica Tandy as Olga. * There is a filmed record of a mid-1960s production by The Actors Studio with Kim Stanley and Geraldine Page as Masha and Olga, respectively, supported by Sandy Dennis's Irina and Shelley Winters as Natasha. * American Film Theatre in 1970 filmed a version with a witty Masha from
Joan Plowright Joan Ann Olivier, Baroness Olivier, (née Plowright; born 28 October 1929), professionally known as Dame Joan Plowright, is an English retired actress whose career has spanned over seven decades. She has won two Golden Globe Awards and a Ton ...
opposite Alan Bates as Vershinin, with Ronald Pickup as Tusenbach and Laurence Olivier, who co-directed, playing Chebutykin. The film was based on a theatre production that Olivier directed at the Royal National Theatre in 1967. * Rosemary Harris, Ellen Burstyn and Tovah Feldshuh played, respectively, Olga, Masha and Irina at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in the 1970s with René Auberjonois as Solyony. * A 1982 production at Manhattan Theatre Club, had Dianne Wiest as Masha, Lisa Banes as Olga, Mia Dillon as Irina, Christine Ebersole as Natasha, Sam Waterston as Vershinin, Jeff Daniels as Andrei, Bob Balaban as Tusenbach, and Jack Gilford as Chebutykin. * Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre Company put one together under the direction of Austin Pendleton, with Molly Regan as Olga, Joan Allen as Masha, Rondi Reed as Natasha, and Kevin Anderson as Solyony. * In 1985 Casper Wrede directed a production at the Royal Exchange, Manchester with Cheryl Prime as Natasha, Emma Piper as Olga, Janet McTeer as Masha,
Niamh Cusack Niamh Cusack ( ; born 20 October 1959) is an Irish actress. Born to a family with deep roots in the performing arts, Cusack has been involved as a performer since a young age. She has served with the UK's two leading theatre companies, the R ...
as Irina and
Espen Skjonberg Espen is a Norwegian masculine given name. In Norway it reached the peak of its popularity between 1970 and 1990, during which period approximately 1.1% of children were given that name. Origin and variants It originated as a variant of Asbjørn or ...
as Dr Chebutykin. * The Roundabout Theatre in New York had Jerry Stiller as Chebutykin, Billy Crudup as Solyony, Eric Stoltz as Tuzenbach, Lili Taylor as Irina, Paul Giamatti as Andrei, Amy Irving as Olga, Jeanne Tripplehorn as Masha, Calista Flockhart as Natasha, and David Strathairn as Vershinin. * In 1990, the Irish theatrical dynasty, the Cusacks, were cast in the play, in a new version by
Frank McGuinness Professor Frank McGuinness (born 1953) is an Irish writer. As well as his own plays, which include ''The Factory Girls'', '' Observe the Sons of Ulster Marching Towards the Somme'', '' Someone Who'll Watch Over Me'' and '' Dolly West's Kitchen ...
, which opened at the
Gate Theatre The Gate Theatre is a theatre on Cavendish Row in Dublin, Ireland. It was founded in 1928. History Beginnings The Gate Theatre was founded in 1928 by Hilton Edwards and Micheál MacLiammóir with Daisy Bannard Cogley and Gearóid Ó Lochlainn ...
in
Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 ...
with the three award-winning sisters
Sinéad Cusack Sinéad Moira Cusack ( ) is an Irish actress. Her first acting roles were at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, before moving to London in 1969 to join the Royal Shakespeare Company. She has won the Critics' Circle and ''Evening Standard'' Awards f ...
(Masha),
Sorcha Cusack Sorcha Cusack (; born 9 April 1949) is an Irish television and stage actress. Her numerous television credits include playing the title role in '' Jane Eyre'' (1973), '' Casualty'' (1994–1997), ''Coronation Street'' (2008) and ''Father Brown' ...
(Olga) and
Niamh Cusack Niamh Cusack ( ; born 20 October 1959) is an Irish actress. Born to a family with deep roots in the performing arts, Cusack has been involved as a performer since a young age. She has served with the UK's two leading theatre companies, the R ...
(Irina) in the title rôles and their father
Cyril Cusack Cyril James Cusack (26 November 1910 – 7 October 1993) was an Irish stage and screen actor with a career that spanned more than 70 years. During his lifetime, he was considered one of Ireland’s finest thespians, and was renowned for his in ...
as Dr. Chebutykin. This is the only production ever to cast three 'real' sisters, professional actors in their own rights, in the title rôles. The production, which was directed by the then newly appointed Artistic Director of the Royal Shakespeare Company, Adrian Noble, transferred to London's
Royal Court Theatre The Royal Court Theatre, at different times known as the Court Theatre, the New Chelsea Theatre, and the Belgravia Theatre, is a West End theatre#London's non-commercial theatres, non-commercial West End theatre in Sloane Square, in the Royal ...
for a sell-out season in 1991. Amongst the supporting cast were
Lesley Manville Lesley Ann Manville (born 12 March 1956) is an English actress known for her frequent collaborations with Mike Leigh, appearing in the films ''Grown-Ups'' (1980), '' High Hopes'' (1988), '' Secrets & Lies'' (1996), '' Topsy-Turvy'' (1999), ''A ...
as Natasha and Finbar Lynch as Tusenbach. * In 1991, sisters Vanessa Redgrave (Olga) and Lynn Redgrave (Masha) made their first and only appearance together onstage in this, with niece Jemma Redgrave as Irina at the Queen's Theatre, London. * In 2003, Romanian director Radu Afrim adapted the play in a controversial production at the ''Andrei Mureşanu'' theatre in Sfantu-Gheorghe, highly criticized by Michael Billington, but praised by other critics, leading to a local controversy in the Romanian press which would catapult Afrim to national superstardom in Romanian theatre. * The play was produced in 2010 at the Lyric Hammersmith by Filter with a cast including Poppy Miller, Romola Garai and Clare Dunne. * In 2010, the play was adapted by for Theatre Na Fidlovačce,
Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...
as ''Tři sestry''. The sisters played
Andrea Černá Andrea Černá is a Czech theatrical and television actress, born 13 February 1977 in Karlovy Vary. She studied at the Prague Conservatory. Filmography *''Pátá žena'' (2008) *''10 způsobů'' (2007) *''Slečna Guru'' (2006) *''Kameňák 2'' ...
, Zuzana Vejvodová and Martina Randová and other actors were Otakar Brousek ml. as Vershinin,
Tomáš Töpfer Tomáš Töpfer (born 10 January 1951) is a Czech film and television actor and politician. He was named Best Actor at the 1995 Alfréd Radok Awards. At the 2006 Thalia Awards he won the category of Best Actor in an Operetta or Musical. Select ...
as Doctor Chebutykin * In 2012, the play was staged at the Young Vic, directed by Benedict Andrews in his own new version. The cast included Vanessa Kirby, Mariah Gale and Sam Troughton. * In 2014, the play was staged at the Southwark Playhouse, directed by Russell Bolam. The cast included Olivia Hallinan, Holliday Grainger and Paul McGann. * In 2017, the play was staged at the Studio Theatre directed by Jackson Gay in conjunction with a modern adaption called ''No Sisters;; directed by Aaron Posner. * In 2017, the play was staged by Sydney Theatre Company at the Drama Theatre, Sydney Opera House from 6 November — 16 December. The new adaptation was by Andrew Upton and the cast included Alison Bell as Olga, Miranda Daughtry as Irina and Harry Greenwood as Tusenbach. *In 2019, the play was staged a
the Almeida
Theatre in London, with Alan Williams playing Ivan Romanovich Chebutykin.


Adaptations

* ''Three Sisters'' has been adapted into a full-length
opera Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a libre ...
by Hungarian composer Péter Eötvös and Claus H. Henneberg, as '' Tri sestry (Three Sisters)''. It was premiered at the Opéra National de Lyon in 1998, directed by
Ushio Amagatsu is a Japanese choreographer known as the leader of the ''Butoh'' dance group ''Sankai Juku'', which he founded in 1975. He is the artistic director, choreographer and a dancer of Sankai Juku. He was also a co-founder of the seminal Butoh collect ...
, and conducted by Kent Nagano and the composer. * '' Three Sisters on Hope Street'', a 2008 British play co-written by
Diane Samuels Diane Samuels (born 1960) is a British author and playwright. Samuels was born into a Jewish family in Liverpool in 1960. She was educated at King David High School, Liverpool, studied history at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge and then studie ...
and Tracy Ann Oberman, reinterprets Chekhov's play by transferring events to Liverpool after
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
and re-casting the Pozorov sisters as three Jewish Englishwomen. It opened at the Everyman Theatre, Liverpool on 25 January 2008 before beginning a second run at the Hampstead Theatre in London. * In 2011, the play was adapted by
Blake Morrison Philip Blake Morrison FRSL (born 8 October 1950) is an English poet and author who has published in a wide range of fiction and non-fiction genres. His greatest success came with the publication of his memoirs ''And When Did You Last See Your Fat ...
for Northern Broadsides as ''We Are Three Sisters'', drawing out parallels with the lives of the Brontë sisters. * In 2020 an adaptation of the play by Inua Ellams, set in Owerri,
Nigeria Nigeria ( ), , ig, Naìjíríyà, yo, Nàìjíríà, pcm, Naijá , ff, Naajeeriya, kcg, Naijeriya officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa. It is situated between the Sahel to the north and the Gulf of G ...
during the Nigerian Civil War between 1967 and 1970, was staged at the Lyttelton Theatre in
London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
. * Track 3, a 2013 adaptation of the play created by Theatre Movement Bazaar co-founders, Tina Kronis and Richard Alger. It premiered in Los Angeles and has played in the UK, China, and in 2017 was the first US production in over 25 years to play in the Chekhov International Theatre Festival in Moscow. * ''Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow'', a stage adaptation by Halley Feiffer that approaches the story through a contemporary
lens A lens is a transmissive optical device which focuses or disperses a light beam by means of refraction. A simple lens consists of a single piece of transparent material, while a compound lens consists of several simple lenses (''elements'' ...
, originally premiering in 2017.


Notes


References


External links

* *
Oxquarry Books
an English translation of ''Three Sisters''
Project Gutenberg
English translations of several Chekhov plays, including ''Three Sisters''
Full text of ''Three Sisters''
*
''Three Sisters'' from Czech theatre 'Divadlo na Fidlovačce', Prague
{{DEFAULTSORT:Three Sisters (Play) 1901 plays Three Sisters, The Plays set in Russia