Southern Utah University’s Department of Theatre, Dance, and Arts Administration will be opening one of the final shows in their 2024-2025 season on April 9 in the Eileen and Allen Anes Studio Theatre. “Three Sisters,” written by Anton Chekov and directed by SUU professor Peter Sham has performances April 9, 11, 12 and 17 at 7:30 p.m. with a matinee performance April 19 at 2 p.m.
“Three Sisters” marks Sham’s first time directing a show in the Anes, allowing him to put in practice skills that he has been teaching students in his directing classes. Despite this new experience, Sham has felt that the rehearsal process went smoothly.
“All I do is put together the best humans that I can get in a room for the right roles, for what I’m looking for, and then the rest just kind of goes a long way,” said Sham.
“Three Sisters” is a slice-of-life play about the titular Prozorov sisters, their brother and the significant people in their lives. The story is told in a way that is not typical of storytelling.
“It just doesn’t follow a plot structure, like the beginning, the climax and the resolution,” said Charlie Stewart, who plays youngest sister Irina. “There is some semblance of that in the way that the characters act, it’s very character driven … there’s things that happen, but it’s very much what the characters are feeling in their interpersonal relationships.”
Sham and the cast refer to “Three Sisters” as a play about “nothing,” with that nothingness being a motivating factor for many of the characters.
“‘Three Sisters’ is about inaction, which is ironic for a play, but it is about not doing anything. It’s about having aspirations to do things,” said AJ Newbury, who plays Baron Nikolay Lvovitch Tuzenbach. “It is about wanting so bad, but not doing.”
The lack of a specific plot in “Three Sisters” was intentionally done by Chekov, who was known as a driving force behind the introduction of modernism in theatre.
“(It) is the greatest play ever written about nothing,” said Sham. “(Chekov) did that on purpose. That was what he set out to do.”
Though it does not follow a typical plot structure, “Three Sisters” tells a story about longing and hope.
“I think everybody has dreams. Everybody is longing for something,” said Stewart. “The point of ‘Three Sisters,’ why it was written, and also why we’re putting it on now, is so that we can inspire the audience to go after their dreams.”
The cast of “Three Sisters” hope that the audience will see themselves in the characters, and that it will inspire them to be more active in their own lives.
“You’ll look at these characters and you will scream in your mind, ‘oh, my god, do something. Do the thing,’” said Newbury. “But they won’t do it. And then you’ll take a look at your own life and be like, ‘wow, I am not doing anything.’”
“Three Sisters” will be performed in conjunction with “The Anastasia Trials in the Court of Men,” with both shows taking place in the Anes on different nights. Tickets for both shows are free to SUU students, staff and faculty.
“The way that this cast is able to balance the levity of the comedy and the gravity of the realness is so beautiful,” said Newbury. “Everyone is in the moment the entire time, and just for that, it is so, so awesome to watch.”
Author: Tessa Cheshire
Photographer: Tessa Cheshire
Editor: Anna Mower
arts@suunews.net
