The Cherry Orchard

Carmen Aguirre is a Chilean-Canadian director, playwright, and actor known for her bold, darkly comic storytelling and powerful explorations of identity and resilience. A Core Artist with Vancouver’s Electric Company Theatre, she has written or co-written more than twenty-five plays, including The Refugee Hotel, Blue Box, and Chile Con Carne.

As a director, Carmen has led productions across Canada, including recent work at Studio 58 and here at the University of Victoria’s Phoenix Theatre—where you may remember her acclaimed 2023 production of Mojada. Her directing practice spans new plays, contemporary re-imaginations, and socially engaged creations.

As an actor, she has appeared in more than eighty film, television, and theatre productions and is a recipient of the Betty Mitchell Award for Outstanding Supporting Performance.

Read Carmen’s full biography on her website.

Anton Chekhov (1860–1904) was a Russian playwright and author. He is considered to be one of the greatest writers of short fiction in history. His career as a playwright produced four classics, and his best short stories are held in high esteem. Chekhov practiced as a medical doctor throughout most of his literary career. “Medicine is my lawful wife,” he once said, “and literature is my mistress.”

Chekhov renounced the theatre after the reception of The Seagull in 1896, but the play was revived to acclaim in 1898 by Konstantin Stanislavski’s Moscow Art Theatre, which subsequently also produced Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya and premiered his last two plays, Three Sisters and The Cherry Orchard. These four works presented a challenge to the acting ensemble as well as to audiences, because in place of conventional action, Chekhov highlighted the depths of human nature, the hidden significance of everyday events, and the fine line between comedy and tragedy. Chekhov died of tuberculosis on July 15, 1904, in Badenweiler, Germany.

Bio from Concord Theatricals. View Anton Chekhov’s full catalogue of plays.

Michael Frayn was born in London in 1933. He began his career as a reporter for the Guardian and later the Observer. After leaving the Observer, he continued to write as a columnist as well as publishing novels and plays for television and stage.

His plays for the stage include Copenhagen, After Life, The Two of Us, Alphabetical Order, Donkeys’ Years, Clouds, Balmoral (Liberty Hall), Make and Break, Noises Off, Benefactors, Alarms and Excursions, Look Look, Here and Make and Break. Other translations include four full-length Chekhov plays (The Cherry Orchard, Three Sisters, The Seagull and Uncle Vanya) and four one-act plays (The Evils of Tobacco, Swan Song, The Bear and The Proposal).

Bio from Concord Theatricals. View Michael Frayn’s full catalogue of plays.