The script pages that follow fall into two categories:
In background notes (see menu link below) I explain why I tackled such a huge project as turning The Seagull into hyperdrama. The project took almost ten years, and I feel both relief and satisfaction in its completion. Hyperdrama is an extraordinary theatrical form, perhaps satisfying the very cry of Treplev in The Seagull for "new theater forms." At the same time, thus far in theatrical history, hyperdrama has been relegated to an odd form of entertainment at best but certainly not a theatrical form to be taken seriously as a challenge to traditional dramaturgy.
If the Chekhov Hyperdrama can upset, even in the smallest way, this ridiculous and easy notion, I will be delighted.
Charles Deemer
July, 2002