THE CHERRY ORCHARD
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| James Earl Jones, Earle Hyman, Robert Jackson, Gloria Foster, Zakes Mokae. |
Reviews of live theatre being impossible during these days of the pandemic, THEATRE'S LEITER SIDE
is pleased to provide instead accounts of previous theatre
seasons--encompassing the years 1970-1975-for theatre-hungry readers. If you'd
like to know the background on how this previously unpublished series came to
be and what its relationship is to my three The Encyclopedia of
the New York Stage volumes (covering every New York play, musical,
revue, and revival between 1920 and 1950), please check the prefaces to any of
the entries beginning with the letter “A.” See the list at the end of the
current entry.
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| Josephine Premice. |
THE CHERRY
ORCHARD [Dramatic Revival] A: Anton Chekhov; TR: Avrahm Yarmolinsky; D: Michael
Schultz; S: David Mitchell; C: Theoni V. Aldredge; L: Ian Calderon; M: John
Morris; P: New York Shakespeare Festival; T: Public Theater/Florence S.
Anspacher Theater; 12/7/72-3/18/73 (86)
There were two
memorable revivals of The Cherry Orchard in the 70s, one directed at the Vivian Beaumont in 1977 by Andrei Serban, and
starring Irene Worth, and the present one, conceived by actor James Earl Jones as an
all-black but theatrically traditional presentation. Jones played Lopahin, the
peasant landowner, to glowing reviews. He also had been the production’s
original director but chose to bow out and let Michael Schultz take over.
Producer Joseph Papp, notable for the advances he had made in producing the
classics with integrated casts, was testing the waters for an all-black
classical acting company, an idea he returned to unsuccessfully late in the
decade.
The notion of a
black production of Chekhov aroused considerable discussion but the critics,
for the most part, found the proof of the pudding in the production itself. The
reception was largely negative. Clive Barnes saw “no special point” in the
casting. He faulted the work for being “brusque” and for lacking “literary and
political resonances.” He thought “the staging never quite took fire.” There
was none of the surprise anticipated by Walter Kerr in seeing a black company
do this white play. The result, aside from several fine performances, was “dull.”
John Simon said the black concept “makes no sense whatever,” and the “deplorable”
production did nothing to change his mind. Harold Clurman’s many criticisms
included one aimed at the “quality of soulfulness” he saw nowhere in evidence.
Douglas Watt felt that the company was “uneasy . . . in varying degrees,” but
Edith Oliver was impressed by the “boldness and sincerity” of the playing.
Martin Gottfried fond his antagonism toward the show’s “backward . . .
liberalism” dissipated by “one of the most affecting versions of the play I
have ever seen.” “Schultz has staged the play as a tapestry of faded romance,”
he observed.
For the actors,
the reviews were mixed. No leading thespian got away unscarred but the
consensus held that Jones’s boisterous Lopahin was the centerpiece, a powerful performance
that overshadowed the emotional Ranevskaya of Gloria Foster. Jones received the
Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Performance. Other noteworthy names in the revival
included Zakes Mokae as Firs, Ellen Holly as Varya, Earle Hyman as Gayev, and Josephine
Premice as Charlotta.
Previous entries:
Abelard and
Heloise
Absurd Person
Singular
AC/DC
“Acrobats”
and “Line”
The Advertisement/
All My Sons
All Over
All Over Town
All the Girls Came
Out to Play
Alpha Beta
L’Amante Anglais
Ambassador
American Gothics
Amphitryon
And Miss Reardon
Drinks a Little
And They Put
Handcuffs on the Flowers
And Whose Little
Boy Are You?
Anna K.
Anne of Green
Gables
Antigone
Antiques
Any Resemblance to Persons Living or Dead
Applause
Ari
As You Like It
Augusta
The Au Pair Man
Baba Goya [Nourish the Beast]
The Ballad of Johnny Pot
Barbary Shore
The Bar that Never Closes
The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel
The Beauty Part
The Beggar’s Opera
Behold! Cometh the Vanderkellens
Be Kind to People Week
Berlin to Broadway with Kurt Weill
Bette Midler’s Clams on a Half-Shell Revue
Black Girl
Black Light Theatre of Prague
Black Picture Show
Black Sunlight
The Black Terror
Black Visions
Les Blancs
Blasts and Bravos: An Evening with H,L.
Mencken
Blood
Bluebeard
Blue Boys
Bob and Ray—The Two and Only
Boesman and Lena
The Boy Who Came to Leave
Bread
A Breeze from the Gulf
Brief Lives
Brother Gorski
Brothers
Bullshot Crummond
Bunraku
The Burnt Flower Bed
Butley
Button, Button
Buy Bonds, Buster
The Cage
Camille
Candide (1)
Candide (2)
The Candyapple
Captain Brassbound’s Conversion
The Caretaker
La Carpa de los Raquichis
The Carpenters
The Castro Complex
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
The Changing Room
Charles Abbott and Son
Charley’s Aunt
Charlie Was Here and Now He’s Gone
Chemin de Fer