Melikhovo Spring blooms in Moscow Region

The Melikhovo Spring festival has become a tradition in the Moscow Region. This year it is dedicated to Anton Chekhov’s 150th birthday.

For several years in a row, the picturesque country estate where Chekhov lived for seven years and wrote his famous The Seagull has been transformed into a live theater stage, while Chekhov’s characters stroll around the grounds.

The Melikhovo Spring is a unique theater festival, which focuses on productions of Chekhov’s plays or performances dedicated to his life and work. No Spring goes by without at least one production of The Seagull. Photo: A cottage where Chekhov wrote The Seagull.

This year the festival features 18 productions by Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, French, Bulgarian and Spanish theaters.

The Hermitage Theater from Moscow with its Secret Papers of a Secret Advisor, the Odessa Russian Drama Theater with its version of Uncle Vanya, and the Lviv Spiritual Theater Voskresinnia with its production of The Cherry Orchard have gathered to participate in the festival. Two drama versions of the short story The Bride will be presented by Moscow’s Benefis Theater and the Teatro de Camara Chejov from Madrid. The International Chekhov Lab is bringing The Seagull to the festival.

Although this year the main setting of the event is the Melikhovo estate, the first play premiered in Serpukhov.

The Cherry Orchard production by the Lviv Spiritual Theater Voskresinnia adopted an unconventional “street format” in its director’s vision.

A scene from The Cherry Orchard by the Lviv Spiritual Theater Voskresinnia.

The Cherry Orchard is not cut down but burnt in this new Ukrainian interpretation.

The characters walking on stilts don’t say a single word during the entire play.

The Melikhovo Spring international theater festival runs until May 22. The spectators will be able to see 18 productions of Anton Chekhov’s works or plays based on his life. Photo: A scene from The Cherry Orchard by the Lviv Spiritual Theater Voskresinnia.