Chekhov’s Three Sisters Visit Beckett

Last week, I saw an updated Chekhov’s Three Sisters at the ART in Cambridge. The acting was great. Much of the message that the Polish director, Krystian Lupa, wanted to convey came through the non-verbal actions of the characters and they responded well to the challenge. As this review in the Boston Globe, An existential 'Sisters' act, by Ed Siegel, states, the play has a “Waiting for Godot” quality. Ed was there the same night we saw the play. The sisters are forever stuck in a Russian provincial town waiting to get back to Moscow where everything will be good again.

One of the older characters alluded to what happen to Moscow when the Napoleon invaded and we all know what would happen to the upper class in Moscow in a few years from the setting of this play. But not to worry, there is no hope of the sisters getting there by the end of the play. This is a take on Chekhov that is much more entertaining than the one I got in college drama classes where he was compartmentalized as a chronicler of the declining Russian middle class. If you are in the Boston area, I certainly recommend it. The play exceeded my expectations. It runs until January 1.

Comments

[randy.f]

1. I'm one of the poorer Chekov audients. Malgosia Askanas invited me to a performance in Charlestown years ago and I didn't understand it at all. One of my co-workers at the Littauer Library, Aaron Kim, took me to see a student production of the Seagull. I didn't understand it very much. I read some reviews which helped a little.

Three Sisters is a "grown up" production by it also has a grown-up price tag. Minimun prediscount is $37 - with my Harvard staff card it's $18.50. So I could to it. However, at $15,000/year I am much lower on my utility curve than you are. I don't believe Marty Feldstein that an interpersonal comparison cannot exist, I agree that neither he nor I can construct one. How do I decide from your data, if it would be a good investment to go?

2. I appreciate the blinging array of KM links on an earlier post. But where is the KM for newbies?

[Bill Ives]

One of the best introductions to KM remains Tom Davenport's Working Knowledge - in paperback amd likely used through Amazon or other places.