Was Chekhov’s final masterpiece a tragedy or a comedy?
In short: When The Cherry Orchard premiered in 1904, audiences saw a tragedy. Yet the playwright insisted on a different tone. To understand this discrepancy, we must look past the falling trees and into the arrested development of a family unable to act.
Opening at the Moscow Art Theatre on 17 January 1904, Anton Chekhov's final play, The Cherry Orchard, presents a profound dramatic paradox. While the first production was interpreted as a tragedy, Chekhov himself intended the work to be a comedy. The tension lies in the play's lack of overt dramatic action; as director Jean-Louis Barrault noted, the plot simply moves from the orchard being in danger, to being on the verge of sale, to being sold, and finally, to having been sold.
The central conflict involves the impending auction of a large Russian estate to settle mounting mortgages. Despite being presented with various business plans to save the land, the family members—including the feckless Gayev and the returning Ranyevskaya—largely succumb to inertia. They turn inward, reminiscing and failing to implement any meaningful change. The play's climax, the felling of the orchard, occurs off-stage, signaled only by the sound of an axe hitting a trunk.
The characters themselves embody a sense of arrested development. Ranyevskaya returns to Russia after five years in Menton and Paris, following the drowning of her husband and seven-year-old son. Her brother, Gayev, exhibits a childlike regression, often retreating to the sucking of boiled sweets when emotional. This behavior has even invited Freudian analysis, suggesting he remains stuck in the oral stage of human development. Ultimately, the estate is purchased by the son of a former serf, marking the end of an era as the family departs amidst the sounds of destruction.
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Sources
- Summary by Intellect · source: Theatre and The Family, Anton Chekhov 'The Cherry Orchard' - Professor Belinda Jack (novideo)
- Also: Theatre and The Family: Anton Chekhov, 'The Cherry Orchard'
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