Running invisible endurance feats, the characters of Anton Chekhov expose what Henry David Thoreau called “lives of quiet desperation.” When the good doctor’s creations, compassionately but uncompromisingly presented, break loose from boredom and emotional paralysis, it’s only to crash into unrequited love. Like T.S. Eliot’s forlorn J. Alfred Prufrock, they measure out their lives in coffee spoons (or swigs of vodka), dreaming of a future where they could never belong. Bereft of illusion, they expect to be forgotten—unlike us, who don’t expect it.
It’s said that every Chekhov play begins as a comedy and ends as a tragedy. The truth is trickier: The characters trapped in Uncle Vanya, a new production of which will open next April from Lincoln Center Theater, achieve neither extreme. Cursed with consciousness, they’re too aware of their faults to become caricatures but, mired in melancholy, they fall short of monumental suffering. However depressed and unrequited, these leaking lives have a perverse instinct for thwarting each other. They either love too soon or too late or the wrong person or succumb to the inertia of vodka and the balalaika. They’re paralyzed between living in the past or future but never the moment. These drifters never move. But this show surely will move you.
LCT (under the direction of André Bishop) has announced initial casting for their upcoming production of Anton Chekhov’s classic Uncle Vanya: Steve Carell as Vanya, in his Broadway debut, William Jackson Harper as Astrov, Jayne Houdyshell as Mama Voinitski, Mia Katigbak as Marina, Alfred Molina as Alexander Serabryakov, Alison Pill as Sonya, and Anika Noni Rose as Yelena. Director Lila Neugebauer and playwright Heidi Schreck (What the Constitution Means to Me) collaborate on this premiere, which pairs Chekhov’s enduring masterpiece with one of America’s most celebrated contemporary playwrights in a strikingly immediate new translation. Previews begin Tuesday, April 2, 2024, and opening is on Wednesday, April 24, 2024.
Sonya (Alison Pill) and her uncle Vanya (Steve Carell) have devoted their lives to managing the family farm in isolation, but when her celebrated, ailing father (Alfred Molina) and his charismatic wife (Anika Noni Rose) move in, their lives are upended. In the heat of the summer, the wrong people fall in love, desires and resentments erupt, and the family is forced to reckon with the ghosts of their unlived lives.
Uncle Vanya
Lincoln Center Theater
Vivian Beaumont Theater, 150 West 65 Street
for tickets ($39 to $179), visit Vanya Broadway or LCT
UNCLE VANYA will have sets by Mimi Lien, costumes by Kaye Voyce, lighting by Lap Chi Chu and Elizabeth Harper, and sound by Mikhail Fiksel and Beth Lake. Charles M. Turner III will be stage manager.
