Review: Iowa Stage Theatre’s ‘The Seagull’ is Chekhov with a modern soundtrack — and it’s fantastic

I went into The Seagull with some dread. I’ve never been a big fan of Anton Chekhov. The Russian playwright is one of the most influential figures within his medium, likely known to even non-theater-goers by virtue of the concept of “Chekhov’s gun.” His reputation as one of the greatest playwrights of all time is well earned — it’s just that my limited exposure to him, both onstage and the page, has only elicited my unenthused appreciation.

Thus, it’s no small feat that Iowa Stage Theatre director Alex Wendel and cast conjured a production of The Seagull that I absolutely adored.

The play, (which opens Iowa Stage Theatre Company’s 2026 season with a profound bang) begins with a Russian family of some esteem and their various employees and friends weekending on a countryside property. Konstantin (played by Ethan Seiser) is an aspiring playwright who struggles to imbue his play with a sense of life — yet he persists in showing the small party a new work staring Nina (Brittny Rebhuhn), a young woman and aspiring actress who Konstantin loves unrequitedly.

For the first two-thirds of the play, rather than going backstage upon leaving a scene, the actors instead sat in chairs at the back of the stage, themselves watching events unfold. It’s a nice feature that underlines the characters’ concern with being observed and their eagerness to observe other characters. Nina and Konstantin are both desperate to have their art seen and appreciated, the brooding author Trigorin (Mason Ferguson) is desperate to be seen outside the shadow of Tolstoy, and teacher Medvedenko (Sean Canuso) is desperate to be of any note to anyone at all.

The cast is perfectly in tune with not only their characters, but the kind of show they are presenting: a show that starts with the romanticized display of human aspiration and gradually turns darker as aspirations devolve to desperation.

The thing that I most adored about Iowa Stage Theatre’s production of The Seagull is probably the thing others are most likely to find superfluous, that being the use of music — something that, as best as I can tell, was not a feature of the productions of the 1890s.

Music is interspersed throughout the show with characters playing piano or violin. Others hum or sing an off-handed bar of music like a brief soliloquy. When the audience comes back from intermission, Craig Petersen — who portrays Shamrayev, the manager of the property on which the play is set — is strumming a guitar, eventually performing the 2022 song “All My Love” by Noah Kahan.

(During this song, it occurred to me that Anton Chekhov exists closer in time to Noah Kahan than he does to William Shakespeare, who is referenced by the script.)

A playlist for the show was made by Wendel and his collaborators, which was accessible via a QR code on one of the posters outside the theater. Lizzy McAlpine’s “doomsday” is the first song on that playlist and I’d assert that if you like that song, you will essentially like the whole of this production.

The inclusion of music, to me, not only felt natural, but warmed me up to the setting and characters much faster. Additionally, to my eye, Wendel doesn’t lose any of the original flavor with the addition of music. He approaches his direction of the classic like a keen chef.

Wendel understands what is great about Chekov’s work and, by adding just a little bit of spice, he can make it sing — highlighting to me why this masterpiece has endured.