The characters of Cherry Orchard peer with dismay into the future, into the unknown. There will be progress, the cherry orchard will be cut down and in its place there will be something else erected. Then new people will come and demolish that which was built by their predecessors. What will happen next? The characters of Director Galina Volchek’s production know that there will be nothing next. It fills the play with suffering and feverish joy, which hides behind it, the hopeless tragedy.

The Moscow-based Sovremennik Theatre is one of the giants of the Russian theatrical and artistic landscape. The company has toured extensively in Europe and America and were the first foreign company to win an American Drama Desk Award. Now the West End can experience Sovremennik’s stylish productions, with lavish, visually stunning scenery and costumes and performances honed on stages across the world.

Sovremennik’s strictly limited season at the Noël Coward Theatre, made possible with generous support from Roman Abramovich, features three plays over six days: Into the Whirlwind, Three Sisters and The Cherry Orchard. This is the first time in over 20 years a major Russian theatre company has performed in the capital.