Everett’s taking big steppes in Chekhov
RUPERT EVERETT confessed that he’s always wanted to play Uncle Vanya. ‘I’ve never managed to elbow my way in,’ he told me.
But now, thanks to the benevolence of producers Jonathan Church and Danny Moar, Everett will get his chance to take the title part in Anton Chekhov’s great comedy. And what’s more: he will direct the work, too.
‘I’ve been dying to play Vanya,’ Everett said, adding that over the years, he has conceived an idea about how to stage it. He explained that he filmed And Quiet Flows The Don on the Russian steppes near Rostov.
‘It’s an amazing wasteland, and my idea is to set Uncle Vanya in a house in the middle of nowhere,’ he said.
The set will be designed by Charles Quiggin.
Everett said Vanya ‘ feels like he’s wasted his life, stuck in the middle of nowhere — a feeling that lots of people get in middle age’.
‘Its a great part about middle age, and the dawn of old age,’ he added. ‘ That’s the thing I find most touching about it. It’s funny, too.’
Everett is busy casting the other roles for the new adaptation by David Hare, which will run at the Theatre Royal, Bath, from July 18 until August 3.
The production will mark his theatrical directing debut, following on from last year’s The Happy Prince: his big screen directorial debut, which he also wrote and appeared in (as Oscar Wilde).
Later this year, Everett’s hoping to make another movie, D For Dog, which he described as an autobiographical comingof-age tale set in 1970s Paris. ‘I’m looking to cast an 18-yearold version of me!’ he said.