Katya Kamotskaia knows just how to handle Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull, a play that the writer described as having tons of love but a great deal of conversation and little action.

Therefore, the characters’ inner workings must be brought to light—their loves, hopes, joy and suffering, said Kamotskaia, who is directing the 1895 play as the winter quarter Granada artist in residence in the Department of Theatre and Dance.

“I use a lot of improvisational work early in rehearsal to allow the actors to create the ‘real’ relationships and feelings between them, (that) they will need for the play,” she said.

“This means my work is very actor-led, so that every production I direct is unique to that group of individuals.”

The Seagull, set on a Russian country estate during the late 19th century, is a comedy that follows a dozen people as they search in their own ways for happiness.

Among the characters embodying the main themes of the play are two generations of actors and writers struggling with both their own creativity and intertwined love stories.

Arkadina, an established actress, fights her own personal and professional jealousies of the young ingénue, Nina. Trigorin, Arkadina’s lover, a fêted writer subject to his own creative doubts, falls under Nina’s spell. And Konstantin, Arkadina’s long-ignored son, loses the love of both his mother and Nina to the older writer, as well as his ambition to win at writing.

The Seagull’s “little action” revolutionized the world of theatre, which previously relied on melodramatic convention that showcased heroes and heroines and their large deeds.

Kamotskaia possesses rare knowledge and understanding of Chekhov’s works and Russian culture.

She trained in the Stanislavski system in Moscow, and worked as an actress throughout the former Soviet Union. She spent the last 10 years at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama in Glasgow, Scotland, training actors and directing—and developing her own system of working with student actors.

“Katya’s rehearsal process is unlike anything I’ve experienced before,” said Bella Merlin, a professor in the Department of Theatre and Dance. “She mixes her observation of what each of us brings to the role with her own very detailed understanding of the play. She finds the wit, humor, secret love affairs and painful jealousies.”

Merlin studied under Kamotskaia at the All-State Institute of Cinematography in Moscow, and has acted in theater, television, radio and film for 20 years.

For Kamotskaia’s The Seagull at UC Davis, Merlin plays Arkadina—and the professor said she enjoys the challenge. “She’s an actress, and maybe not a very good one,” Merlin said. “How do I find the moments when she’s not acting? And how to try and act badly without actually being bad!?”

All of the other cast members are UC Davis students: Master of Fine Arts candidates Amy Louise Cole (Polina), Michael Davison (Trigorin), Brett Duggan (Shamrayev), Barry Hubbard (Dorn), Brian Livingston (Sorin) and Anne Reeder (Masha); and undergraduates Matthew Canty (Medvedenko), Hannah Glass (Dynia), Cody Messick (Nina), Ben Moroski (Konstantin) and Alejandro Torres (Yakov).

Mark Stevenson, one of two assistant directors, previously studied under Kamotskaia and has been working with her as a co-director for six months.

Said Kamotskaia: "I think this collaboration brings unique challenges and dimensions to the work. Understanding my methods as well as offering a different view gives actors more choices and brings extra levels to their existence on stage.”

M.F.A. candidate Candice Andrews is the other assistant director. “With Katya, thorough script analysis is essential before allowing actors to begin to inhabit their characters. An actor must understand the intent behind every curl of the finger for ultimate believability for themselves in the discovery process and for the audience.”

Undergraduate Reed Wagner, stage manager, said he finds Kamotskaia’s directing style very straightforward in comparison with the style of other directors. “She really understands the nature of the process and what needs to happen to get things done, while at the same time leaving a lot of space for her team to work creatively.”

By all accounts from crew, cast and concept artists, Kamotskaia creates a warm familial environment.

"I am happy to let all the experts—set, costume, lighting and sound designers—bring their separate skills to bear, so the production belongs to everyone.”

For this production, she is working with M.F.A. candidates Jamie Kumpf (scenery), Sarah Kendrick (costumes) and Jacob Nelson (lighting); and undergraduate Christian Savage (sound).

Kamotskaia’s beaming smile beckoned: “The Seagull is about eternal questions—faith, life, love, creativity, passion and pain, theatre, writing, destiny, glory, and more love. Come along and see what we mean.”

Reporting by Janice Bisgaard, publicity manager for the Department of Theatre and Dance.

AT A GLANCE

WHAT: The Seagull, by Anton Chekhov

WHEN: 8 p.m. March 12-13, and 2 p.m. March 14

WHERE: Main Theatre

TICKETS are available through the Mondavi Center: (530) 754-2787 or (866) 754-2787, or mondaviarts.org.

DISCOUNT for school and youth groups of 10 or more: $5 per ticket, at the teacher's or group leader’s request. To make arrangements for this offer, call the Department of Theatre and Dance, (530) 752-5863.

ADVISORY: This production contains brief loud noise.

WORKSHOP: Idle Destruction, an afternoon around (and beside) The Seagull, 1–5 p.m. today (March 12), 101 Wright Hall. Granada Artist-in-Residence Katya Kamotskaia and Department of Theatre and Dance faculty are presenting the workshop, which is free and open to the public. More information.

BIOGRAPHIES

The Russian-born Katya Kamotskaia has been acting and teaching internationally for the last 25 years. She started her professional training in the Youth Theatre Studio, led by leading actor-director Oleg Tabakov (now artists director of the Moscow Art Theatre). From there, she won a place in Vakhtangov’s School (now called Schukin’s College). During her training, she took part in the Grotowski Theatre-Laboratory workshop entitled The Tree of People (Dzevo Ludzi). Herein began her own unique combining of Stanislavski and Grotowski.

Her acting work includes 10 years of leading roles at Stanislavski’s Theatre, Moscow, and the Moscow Philharmonia (including performances of her own one-woman recital show), various television and film appearances, as well as serving as second director on Savva Kulish’s film Iron Curtain (1991). Most recently she starred in the BBC Radio play, The Return of the Prodigal, and in I Confess at the Arches in Glasgow.

For 10 years, Kamotskaia taught at the All-State Institute of Cinematography in Moscow, where she also completed a postgraduate degree (Master of Philosophy equivalent) as a theoretical researcher in film and television.

Since 1999, she has been teaching practical acting, acting theory and acting for camera at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. She has directed and assisted with many productions, including Three Sisters, Much Ado About Nothing, The Glass Menagerie and Crime and Punishment for the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, which she also adapted and translated.

She has led workshops at eight international summer schools in Russia and the United Kingdom, and presented at conferences throughout the world, including the United States, United Kingdom, Russia and the Czech Republic, and at venues that include London’s Barbican Centre. She also has taught at the universities of Exeter and Birmingham, and the Central School of Speech and Drama, all in the United Kingdom.

In addition to writing many articles on actor-training (featuring Stanislavski, Michael Chekhov and Grotowski, as well as personal performance experience), Kamotskaia worked intensively with Jean Benedetti on the 2008 translations of Stanislavski’s An Actor Prepares and Building a Role, published by Routledge as An Actor’s Work.

She is now working on her doctorate in research at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama: “The Inner Life of an Actor in Character in Film and Theatre Performance.” Her mentors include acclaimed Russian practitioners, Albert Filozov and Vladimir Ananiev.

Kamotskaia’s present work-in-progress is the development of her own school and theatre company, Stan.Studio-Theatre, which will specialize in the Russian system of training and performance in acting and directing, in collaboration with schools and a professional theatre company in Moscow.

Bella Merlin, professor of acting in the Department of Theatre and Dance, trained as an actor at the University of Birmingham with postgraduate diplomas in acting from the Guildford School of Acting (United Kingdom) and the State Institute of Cinematography in Moscow.

She has been acting in theatre, television, radio and film for 20 years. Her most recent theatre roles have included Eve in Jade McCutcheon’s Elephant’s Graveyard (Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts), Susannah Cibber in A Laughing Matter (Out of Joint/Royal National Theatre), Second Bereaved Mother in David Hare’s verbatim play The Permanent Way (Out of Joint/Royal National Theatre), Pimple in She Stoops to Conquer (Out of Joint/Royal National Theatre), the International Judge, Barbara Williams, in Sarajevo Story at the Lyric Hammersmith with the multimedia Lightwork Theatre Company; Brecht’s Puntila and his Man Matti (Belgrade Theatre, Coventry); and Kennedy in Ron Hutchinson’s new play Topless Mum!!! (Tobacco Factory, Bristol).