This paper analyses Australian director and playwright Simon Stone's play The Cherry Orchard, performed at the LG Arts Centre Seoul in 2024, based on Linda Hutcheon's theory of adaptation and Julia Kristeva's discussion of intertextuality. Stone has gained attention for his adaptations of classics set in the present day in various countries around the world. The play he chose to adapt in Korea was Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard, set in late 19th-century Russia. The Korean version of The Cherry Orchard shows the characteristics of cross-cultural adaptation as described by Linda Hutcheon in that it reveals regional characteristics and hybridity as different cultures meet, clash, and adapt to each other. The aristocratic lady Ranevskaya and the young merchant Lopakhin from the original work are replaced by Song Doyoung (Jeon Doyeon), the third generation of a conglomerate on the verge of bankruptcy, and Hwang Doosik (Park Haesoo), the son of a chauffeur who has become a young businessman. While summoning the structure and themes of the original text, the upheaval of the late Tsarist Russia, where the old regime collapsed and capitalism emerged, is transpositioned into the violent catastrophe unfolding in modern Seoul. The roles of the characters inherit Chekhov's traditional character structure of ‘those who remain in the past’ and ‘those who strive for the future,’ but instead of feudal class structures, they reflect new economic class structures and intergenerational conflicts in a three-dimensional manner. Just as Chekhov's Cherry Orchard symbolises the decline of the aristocracy and the old regime, Stone's Cherry Orchard symbolises the end of the Korean “chaebol” and the era of rapid growth. Chekhov's characteristic lyrical sense of powerlessness and emotional ambiguity, which reveal the essential limitations of human existence, are recontextualised and brought into life. The reinterpreted play The Cherry Orchard will be performed overseas in its Korean version. This play is an example of how classics can be reinterpreted to transcend time and borders and be glocalized in new ways.
Tae-Hooon Lee (Thu,) studied this question.