Almost as awkward as real life – in a good way: The Cherry Orchard at the Arcola
The Cherry Orchard
Arcola Theatre
7 March 2017
Balcony H17, £14
http://www.arcolatheatre.com/event/the-cherry-orchard/
Isn't The Cherry Orchard such a great play? This was one of two recurring thoughts that occupied the back of my mind during this production at the Arcola. The other was: how refreshing it is to experience something less polished than what the National Theatre and its ilk has made me used to. That sounds like a back-handed compliment and I guess it is; but if I compare this Cherry Orchard with the performance of The Seagull at the National (Jonathan Kent's production for the Chichester Festival Theatre), I'd take the Arcola.
Mehmet Ergen directs. I liked the simple designs by Iona McLeish: a white-washed tree sprouts from a bookcase, the action taking place beneath its bower (or rather, its skeletal limbs, thankfully for those of us in the balcony). It works tremendously well in one or two scenes and is a decent backdrop for the rest. Ergen nonsensically garbs the actors in modern, Western dress, but no matter – this offered nothing more than a fleeting initial annoyance (perhaps because the play is so very definitely set in Russia 1904).
Where Ergen has succeeded is in the casting. Sian Thomas is perfect as Renavskaya: she makes her dramatic, passionate, thoughtlessly cruel. Her National Theatre-style projection and delivery is at odds with the rest of the cast and in another play that might be a problem; but here it excellently establishes the star quality Renavskaya is perceived to have by those who have languished in her home town, and who are dazzled and infuriated by her in equal measure.
The same rightness goes through almost the entire cast, and brings the text remarkably close to the awkwardness of real life without you even having to leave your seat. Jack Klaff as Renavskaya's brother Gayev speaks too loudly, too quickly, with a kind of frantic extravagance that is embarrassing – just as it is for the characters in the play. Jude Akuwudike's Lophakin walks under a perpetual cloud of awkwardness; unbearable silences struck with such nerve-wracking unpredictability I genuinely squirmed. And Abhin Galeya as the perpetual student Trofimov had just the air of satisfied superiority to exasperate the heck out of me.
Perhaps this wouldn't work with any other play. But as it is, I can thank Ergen for his vision, which brings to life this great play with a directness I've never enjoyed before.
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