Writer’s Note: Joanna Murray-Smith, UNCLE VANYA
I’d adapt a phone book in order to have a show at the Ensemble. A beautiful space in what must be one of the most glorious little theatre settings in the world, an artist-loving company and a robust, curious and intelligent audience — it’s pure pleasure to be in the building. But the commission to adapt Chekhov’s hilarious, wry and wistful UNCLE VANYA is a gift from the Gods. Chekhov is the writer I wish I could have been, so to step in his shoes some 130 years later and reimagine the play in the language of our own times and with the foibles of my own writing style is the most enticing of opportunities.
Some people might ask why Chekhov’s language needs to change and this is the eternal dilemma for contemporary Artistic Directors. I would say that it doesn’t. And yet, the desire to make the play as effortless to hear and comprehend as it was for Chekhov’s original audiences has unquestionable value. In adapting the work of a master playwright, I do not seek to mess with his story, his characters, his intentions moment to moment throughout the play but to honour them with language that makes their reception as close as possible to the reception of the original audience.
In other words, historical language sometimes doesn’t work for comedic effect. It sometimes sounds stilted or pompous to modern ears. It is sometimes a roadblock to younger audiences who aren’t used to having to “work” to understand a play. So by deftly translating the intention into language that fits it best in this moment now can make the play sing in the way more effectively as it was intended to. Chekhov’s characters are utterly timeless. The pathos of wanting more than one can ever have, of longing to defeat mortality or find love or resent idiots or need money or fear change…. his characters are a reminder that human beings are eternally driven by the same emotions. We are tightly wound magnets for anxiety and longing and we find comedy in tragedy to stay alive.
As a consummate “technician” of storytelling, Chekhov knows how to say so much more about the human condition than in what is actually spoken. His brilliance is in the nuance of his revelatory writing, in the power beneath what is said. As he famously commanded: “Don’t tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass”. With UNCLE VANYA, we leave the play moved by the broken fragments of eternal truths that people stumble over, whether in 1897 or 2024.
Joanna Murray-Smith
Playing 26 Jul – 31 Aug, don’t miss this new adaptation of Chekhov’s classic tragicomedy by Joanna Murray-Smith.