Sydney Theatre Company’s acclaimed production of Uncle Vanya by Anton Chekhov, adapted by Andrew Upton and directed by Tamás Ascher, will tour to the Lincoln Center Festival, New York, with performances from 19 to 28 July 2012.
The announcement comes hot on the heels of last week’s news that STC’s Uncle Vanya was named the best play of the year by Washington Post critic Peter Marks, after what he described as the strongest year of theatre in a decade. Marks put the play in the number one spot on his annual list of theatre's top ten, saying "(it) had the mesmerising power to stun an audience out of complacency over the classics and transform one’s view of a masterpiece”.
The entire original cast – John Bell, Cate Blanchett, Sandy Gore, Hayley McElhinney, Anthony Phelan, Richard Roxburgh, Andrew Tighe, Jacki Weaver and Hugo Weaving – will reprise their roles for the production which was a critical and box office triumph at Sydney Theatre in November and December 2010, before its Kennedy Center run in August of this year.
The production has received exceptional reviews, described as “gloriously fresh, funny and poignant” (John McCallum, The Australian) and “a magnificently mounted and playful production” (Elissa Blake, Sun Herald). “This enthralling production surprises and delights, and leaves you feeling profoundly moved” said Jo Litson in the Sunday Telegraph and “across the board the performances are exceptional” wrote Jason Blake in the Sydney Morning Herald. Reviewing the production in The New York Times, Ben Brantley wrote that he considered the three hours of the show “among the happiest of my theatergoing life”.