I’ve seen Chekhov’s Cherry Orchard 20 times – and it blossoms when tended by the British | Michael Billington

Helen Hunt and Kristin Scott Thomas are leading revivals of the Russian classic whose blend of comedy and tragedy is baked into our own dramatic heritage What kind of play is The Cherry Orchard? As a new production starring Helen Hunt and Kenneth Branagh beckons in Stratford, I am reminded that it is a question people have been asking since the play’s inception. Chekhov himself wrote that what had emerged in his play was “not a drama but a comedy, in places almost a farce”. Stanislavski, who directed the Moscow premiere in 1904, violently disagreed. “It is a tragedy,” he told Chekhov, “whateve

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