The Cherry Orchard
Aussie director Benedict Andrews’s UK reputation is heavily based on his extraordinary 2012 production of Chekhov’s ‘Three Sisters’, which turned the melancholy masterpiece into a wild fin de siècle romp set on a huge black slag heap, in which the titular siblings memorably danced to Nirvana’s ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ while howling their boredom. It only ran for a couple of months at the Young Vic, didn’t transfer, didn’t feature any celebrity names (bar a pre-fame Vanessa Kirby), and while Andrews’s subsequent UK work has been very respectable, ‘Three Sisters’ towers over it. Returning to Chekhov feels, if not risky, then perhaps at risk of disturbing a perfect memory by going back for more. But no – Andrews has done it again with another all-time take. Clearly there is something about Chekhov’s large ensembles, bittersweet humour and tales of fading aristocrats that draw out the best in him. There’s no slag heap this time, but designer Magda Willa has created something equally memorable. In an in-the-round configuration in which cast members sit amongst the audience when not performing, every inch of floor and the entire back hall is covered in geometrically patterned rugs, a mix of ‘70s palette and ‘80s design that feels curiously out of time. That’s something continued by Merle Hensel’s remarkable costumes, a hallucinatory blend of shell suits and hippy garb that brings to mind Wes Anderson if he’d smoked something wacky. It’s an extraordinary visual effect, drolly funn