Comparative Study of Offstage Action in The Cherry Orchard and Miss Julie

Duong, Danny

CID#0698-004

“The most important events in Chekhov’s plays do not necessarily occur on Chekhov’s stage; often the audience experiences some of the most pivotal and dramatic action not by seeing it, but by hearing about it from the characters” (“ClassicNotes: Anton Chekhov”).

In the plays, The Cherry Orchard by Anton Chekhov and Miss Julie by August Strindberg, despite the vast difference in subject matter, plot, and setting, there is an underlying similarity in how each author creates his desired effects, especially through the use of action that does not take place onstage. Strindberg uses offstage action, while Chekhov has utilized a technique that has been dubbed “indirect action.” A second technique that both authors employ is character reflection: a technique wherein a character narrates about an event that has already passed. Through these two techniques, the authors demonstrate that offstage action and character reflection, when used effectively, bring forth the most in a play.

In Strindberg’s play, the culmination of drama occurs at the end of the play, when “the Count’s back” (Strindberg 447). Instantly the mightiness of Jean crumbles to weakness. Both Jean and Miss Julie tremble at the return of the Count. They obviously fear him, implying that he holds dominion over them. As a result, Jean reverts to his lowly status of servitude, and acting as the Count, he orders Miss Julie to slit her own throat because she is too ashamed, and frightened, to face her father after what she has done. It is to “save… [her] honor” and the Count’s “name” that she knows what she “ought to do,” which is take her own life (Strindberg 447). During all this, the Count is never once onstage. The most he does is speak to Jean through the speaking tube, from the other side, and he rings the bell to summon Jean. The audience learns this through the reactions of Jean and Miss Julie. His return sets into motion the resulting drama. This is Strindberg’s instance of indirect action in Miss Julie.

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As for The Cherry Orchard, the most critical point in the play is Act III. Arguably the example of indirect action in this act is appropriately the climax of the play. Here, Ranyevskaya hosts a ball on the estate while the sale of the said estate is taking place in town. Gayev, the brother of the female lead, is present at the auction, accompanied by Lopakhin, and his objective is to purchase the estate. The cherry orchard, and particularly its sale, is the driving action of the play. In the midst of the conversation Ranyevskaya has with Trofimov, the tutor of her deceased son, “in great anxiety” she comments, “If only I knew where the estate was sold or not. It seems such an incredible disaster that I just can’t think” (Chekhov 43). This is the beginning of the drama in Act III directly related to the auction, although definitely other dramatic moments not related to the auction are present. Later, after Anya enters the stage, Anya announces that the estate has been sold, but the buyer is yet unknown. Following all that ensues, Lopakhin finally enters. The suspense that has already gathered is pushed further by his hesitance to tell who has bought the cherry orchard. Next, Gayev enters, speaking to no one but Firs. Soon those two leave, then when asked for the identification of the buyer, Lopakhin answers, “I bought it” (Chekhov 51). That is it; the drama reaches its peak with that statement. All of the drama, all of the action—it all comes from the auction. “This moment… provides the most dramatic of all moments on-stage” (“ClassicNotes: The Cherry Orchard Act III”).

Theater limitations were also an incentive to take advantage of the benefits of offstage action. For instance, the sale of the cherry orchard would have been too cumbersome to show onstage, since the auction is a grand event that would have incorporated excessive props, people, and planning. Similarly, the dance in Miss Julie is somewhat chaotic, too much to put onstage. The same goes for the arrival of the train in the opening and the chopping of the cherry orchard in the conclusion of The Cherry Orchard. Both the train and the tree are extremely gargantuan in size, which would be nigh on impossible to reproduce on a theater stage, especially considering the time period the plays were written: the late 19th century and early 20th century. Lastly, the use of indirect action brings about one final advantage: suspense and tension that cannot be achieved otherwise. The audience does not need to see the cherry orchard being chopped down, nor the suicide of Miss Julie. The audience is made aware when the action occurs.

Narration of the past—sometimes known as character reflection—serves the primary purpose of informing the audience of pertinent background information. This can enlighten the audience to the behavior of a character, allow the audience to better understand a character, or give the audience a more integral perspective. In addition to that, an advantage of using character reflection is unanimous with a benefit of using indirect action: reduced time and production costs. By the same token, playwrights avoid having to show something onerous that words can easily describe; and in terms of video production, “flashbacks” are home to films, not the theater.

In terms of The Cherry Orchard, there exist a few instances of character reflection. For example, the opening scene has Lopakhin, the once-a-peasant-now-a-prosperous-businessman, telling Dunyasha, the chambermaid of the estate, about an event that occurred when he was a child. In doing so, his relationship with Ranyevskaya, the female protagonist, is revealed, which in turn informs the audience of his fondness of and infatuation with her. Moving on, a clearer situation in which this narration occurs is when Anya tells Varya what has happened:

“Anyway, we get to Paris, and it’s cold, it’s snowing. My French is terrible. Mama’s living up on the fifth floor, and when I arrive she’s got people with her—Frenchmen, I don’t know who they were, and ladies, and some ancient Catholic priest holding a prayer-book—and the air’s full of tobacco smoke, and it’s bleak and uncomfortable. And suddenly I felt sorry for mama. I felt so sorry for her I put my arms round her and pressed her head against me and couldn’t let go. After that Mama kept hugging me, and crying…” (Chekhov 5-6).

A similar use of character reflection is evident in Miss Julie. Also in the opening scene, Jean, the valet, informs Christine, the cook, of some quite recent events. First, he tells her why he is late—Miss Julie, the protagonist, prior to the play’s start forced him to dance with her. Second, Christine learns exactly what happened between Miss Julie and her fiancé as to put an end to the engagement: she was training him like a dog, but he did not endure it for long. Coupled with some dialogue by Jean and Christine, this shows Miss Julie’s rambunctious, lowly, and non-aristocratic behavior. Another significant example arises during the fiasco that Miss Julie and Jean have in the middle of the night. Like a storyteller, he tells the story of an event when young, how he “got sick once because… [he] couldn’t have the… [girl he] wanted” (Strindberg 435). Revealing some of his feelings for her, the audience is additionally given some background information pertaining to the two. It is in this way that character reflection shines. As it stands, it is perhaps the most effective and practical method of giving background information about a character or the setting, et al., as well as, in the same token, behavioral attributes and other qualities of characters.

Chekhov was well known for his use of indirect action. However, at the same time, Strindberg employs many of the same techniques. It is through this and character reflection that both playwrights exploit the imagination of the viewer. Invoking the viewer’s imagination incidentally causes him or her to be more involved in the play, producing greater success. Both authors achieve this. The offstage action and the reactions of the characters to the offstage action appearing in both plays teach the audience “that visual action is superfluous, and indeed, unnecessary, next to the reactions of finely sculpted characters.”

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