4. Three Sisters at the MAT M.N. Stroyeva (1964) [P.40-48]

• P.40 Three Sisters was the first play Chekhov wrote especially for the[Moscow] Art Theatre [MAT]
• The rehearsals were conducted by Stanislavski alone.

P.46 Stanislavski gave detailed reasons why he felt it was important to alter Chekhov's stage directions:

• 'I am afraid that if we go gunning after so much game we shall miss our main quarry, which is to present the author's final and optimistic summing up, which compensates for the many sad parts of the play.'
• This coincided completely with the wishes of Chekhov, who, as is well known, said at the first reading of Three Sisters that the pay was 'not a painful drama of Russian life' and kept assuring people that he had written a 'comedy'.

P.47 Stanislavski was so absorbed in keeping the central idea in high relief that he was ready to suppress other ideas which he felt were purely subsidiary.