The Seagull
Royal Shakespeare Company

©  Peter Roberts – Plays International: “Johan Engels’ set is spare and economical (…) tall birch trees at the rear of the set seem to be all there is in the opening scene. (…) On a large open stage like the Barbican it is not easy to achieve the claustrophia Chekhov asks for by bringing his drama indoors as it draws to a close. But Engels has hit on the simple but effective device of enclosing the stage by inserting a vast backdrop of window at the rear of the stage, through which we glimpse what amounts to the ghost of Nina that was.”