ABSTRACT
The production of The Seagull marked the beginning of the second stage of our artistic development. The directors of the plays meanwhile had won a certain degree of authority over the company, and that gave them the possibility of beginning to carry through the artistic objectives laid out by the theatre. Chekhov's objectives coincided in turn with those of Shchepkin and hence with those of our own theatre. Chekhov was not only a poet in the theatre, he was also a sensitive director, critic, designer and musician. There is a real basis, when one is speaking of Chekhov, for being reminded of a landscape by Levitan and melodies of Tschaikowsky. To bring a company to this achievement it is not enough to be a teacher and a director, one must also be a man of letters. This distinction in our theatre belongs to Vladimir Ivanovich Nemirovich-Danchenko, to whom belongs the very idea of the production of The Seagull.
