'Seagull: True Story' to play off Broadway this spring

The new play about a staging of Anton Chekhov's The Seagull will join the spring season at The Public Theater, playing a monthlong run starting in March.

Summary

• Seagull: True Story will play off Broadway at The Public Theater from March 22 to April 26
• The semi-autobiographical political satire is inspired by co-creator Alexander Molochnikov's attempt to stage Chekhov's The Seagull

UPDATE: This article has been edited to include the cast of Seagull: True Story off Broadway.

The Public Theater has added Seagull: True Story to its Off-Broadway spring season, with performances running from March 22 to April 26 only. Opening night is March 30.

Written by Eli Rarey and created and directed by Moscow Art Theatre's Alexander Molochnikov, Seagull: True Story dramatizes Molochnikov’s attempt to stage Anton Chekhov’s classic play The Seagull. The show combines the director's own experience with politically charged satire to explore displacement, censorship, and creative freedom.

The show will feature an ensemble of international artists, including Gus Birney as Nico, Andrey Burkovskiy as MC, Ohad Mazor as Dmitry, Myles McCabe as Sasha, Quentin Lee Moore as Ivan, Keshet Pratt as Pickle, Zuzanna Szadkowski as Olga, Eric Tabach as Kon, and Elan Zafir as Anton.

Seagull: True Story previously ran to acclaim at NYC's La MaMa and London’s Marylebone Theatre. The Public's staging is produced by MART Foundation.

“Since the beginning of the war, four years have passed — exactly as long as the First and Second World Wars lasted,” said Molochnikov in a statement. “One hundred years ago, the poet Mandelstam, who tragically perished under the wheels of the Soviet system, wrote: 'We live, not feeling the country beneath our feet.' I think that many people lived that way then — and live that way today — those who neither speak nor think about the war. That is also a path, but it was not one we could take.

“Our producer Sofia, actor Andrey, and I were not engaged in political theatre before 2022. But when such a catastrophe happens — when it pulls all your friends, your relatives, and you yourself into its millstones — you have to save yourself.

“We saved ourselves through art and tried to tell the story that happened to us, to Russian culture, to the people who were creating freely in Russia before the war. About our decision to leave, impossibility of returning, life in New York.

“I hope this performance feels two countries beneath its feet and, in a vivid, humorous, lyrical, and artistic way, responds to what has been happening to all of us over the past four years.”

Discover more of the Public's 2025-26 season.

Get Seagull: True Story tickets now.

Photo credit: Seagull: True Story. (Photo by Mark Senior)