A PLAY WITHOUT A TITLE

The action takes place at the Voinitsevs' estate

This is one of the most enigmatic plays of Russian literature. No one knows exactly when it was written and how it was to be called. Once, in Chekhov's letters to his brother Alexander, it was called The Fatherless. The title Platonov was provided by the Germans and adopted by Jean Villard in his TNP production. But the title page has never been found, hence we don't know the real title of the play and the most appropriate label is, indeed, "a play without a title". The play was found in 1920, many years after Chekhov's death. This is one of the last plays by Chekhov to be brought to light, although it may have been written first. In any case, scholars have purported that the play was written by a young man, perhaps at the age of eighteen. And so the end of life connects with the beginning as they do in the play, which contains all the future or past motifs of Chekhov's other plays, along with the cruelty and vehemence we are unaccustomed to.

A Play Without a Title reflects life. Life is also a play without a title, so to speak. Especially our life today. Someday it will be defined and labeled, but for the moment it is "titleles". Life. Until death which, as Chekhov wrote, is an event that determines nothing and changes nothing. Even the death of the hero is unable to change anything. Especially since there is no hero, as it turns out. There is no strength, only weakness, weakness and more weakness. The Platonov in all of us is sick, except those who feel no pain. At least for now. That means that this is their time. But the story is not about those people, although it is they who make history today, those people who pay bribes and set people against one another, blackmail and buy out. They act. They are the actors. That's how they see it, in any case. For now. But our story, I repeat, is not about them, but about others who suffer even more from Platonov, meaning from desire, hope, the last futile search for the humorous, cheap and defamed ideal. Platonov. My life. The play is unfinished. Chekhov was either writing a novel in dialogue or jotted down impressions of his time and just couldn't stop. Because the impressions never ceased and could never be systematized. There is yet another play in the drafts themselves, and we borrow from these drafts. We also hear and act our play without a title as modern music about life going on before our eyes, the life we all suffer from. This illness has no name. We have no way of telling what will become of it and how it will end. We can only say with certainty that we really want to live."

Lev Dodin
St. Petersburg, April 9, 1997

Winner of the Golden Mask Award