Three Sisters

Our story starts one sunny day of spring. This is because what seems to be an episode of family life in a provincial town can become an extraordinary and drastic event. The heroes of Chekhov's plays find themselves in both tragic and comic situations... And it is in these very moments that one has to pay increased attention.

Kare! Tománek, dramaturgist of the production

 The play is about banal situations, which seem ordinary and everyday. and it shows how grotesque the human destiny is. Chekhov himself wanted his plays to be staged as vaudevilles: as something wild and comical, which is needed by the Three Sisters text. We highlight the grotesqueness of the story and the situations on a kind of stage of destiny, on which someone makes a promise to us at the beginning that what is going to happen, will be great fun. But then the play is about human lives a bit messed up and a bit clumsy, quite similar to our own.  And by laughing at it, we in fact laugh at ourselves.

Vladimír Morávek, director of the production 

Morávek's Chekhov is characterised by a marked stylisation, expressionistic sneer and scathing colourfulness of the scenographic elements.

Jan Kerbr, Lidové noviny, 19/3/2001 

The Morávek and Tománek team has revealed the dialogues to their very skeleton, but the cuts do honour the sense, atmosphere and the order of the relationships. At the same time, they do not change anything or rewrite anything and everything is depicted just as it was in Anton Pavlovich ... The spectators who have come to see the "well known" Three Sisters may initially view the adaptation as brutal. This is because its cutting edge has slashed many classical scenes which are enjoyed as Chekhov specialities and provide an opportunity for great acting talents However, Morávek does not fashion spiritless puppets from his company. His perception is aimed at exact and thoroughly premeditated interplay of the company, abbreviation and distinct stylisation.

Zdeněk A. Tichý, MF Dnes, 10/4/2001

Everything on the stage happens to the rhythm of the dominating tango. The characters move through days and weeks following at the same time a choreographically strict order, marking life, against which, willingly or unwillingly, no one is able to rebel. The depressing sadness and hopelessness of the present moment. (...) It is only an extraordinarily mature company that can fill the expressive romantic concept to the very edge. And Theatre of the Year from Hradec Králové showed that boldly in its Three Sisters.     

Jiří P. Kříž, Právo, 21/3/2001

Neither the psychological yardstick, nor the probability yardstick can by applied to Morávek's Three Sisters – the characters are figuratively exaggerated. They demonstrate embarrassment and uselessness as well as their consequences: cynicism and evil. (...) Morávek's nature drags him and the whole company to extremes, to tough exaggeration for a tough time.

Věra Ptáčková, Divadelní noviny, 17/4/2001