Review: The Seagull ***

When The Seagull premiered in Russia, it bombed. The critics didn't get it, the audience hated it and Chekhov, with his confidence badly shaken, wondered if he had lost his touch. Today, the play is regarded as a defining moment in theatrical history but that doesn't make it any easier to stage.

In a country retreat fading actress Arkadina can't help being the centre of attention, leaving her son, Konstantin, in the shadows as he desperately tries to prove his own worth as a writer and a cast of other misfits desperate to escape their own failings.

Running through it all is the perils of unrequited love, desperate ambition and broken dreams. It's also a comedy. And that's where the problem lies. The production is the first under York Theatre Royal's partnership with The Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama to give graduating students the chance to work alongside professional actors and directors.

The Class of 2010 certainly has a lot to be proud of with stand-out performances from Pierce Reid as Konstantin, Tony Sehgal as Medvedenko, the hopelessly doting school teacher, and Helen Darbyshire as his indifferent bride Masha. But you can't help thinking they would have been better served by a different play.

Moving between ham comedy and dark tragedy, The Seagull suffers from genre anxiety and a lack of pace. When the play flopped, one critic consoled Chekhov, saying The Seagull was "like life itself". The trouble is real life doesn't necessarily make great theatre.

To May 1.