Act One
A cold morning in May. The nursery in the ancestral manor of Lyubov Ranevskaya. Beyond the window cherry trees are in bloom.

Five years earlier, Lyubov’s husband and son died, and she left her home to live in France. Her daughter Anya has gone to fetch her, and today they return. Lyubov, having no grasp of money, gives it away freely, even though she can’t afford to pay the interest on her estate, which is about to be foreclosed.

The heart of the estate is the cherry orchard. Once the cherries were made into preserves, but nowadays nobody harvests them, and they rot on the ground. A friend of the family, Lopakhin, a prosperous member of the middle class (although his father was a serf), wants to cut down the cherry orchard to build summer cottages for vacationers from the cities. The income from this minor land sale will save the rest of the estate.

Act Two
Near sunset on a summer’s day. A field between the cherry orchard and the house of Gayev, Lyubov’s brother.

As people stroll through, romantic longings become apparent. Lopakhin and Lyubov’s adopted daughter, Varya, seem to suit each other, but they avoid any occasion when they might declare their feelings.

Anya and Trofimov, who was the tutor of little Grisha (the boy who drowned), are idealistically “above love.” Varya is determined to keep them apart, forcing them to steal chances to be together.

The need to find money to pay the interest looms. Gayev might get a loan, or Anya might beg money from a disapproving aunt. In frustration, Lopakhin tries to make Lyubov see that his plan to sell the orchard is the only way to save the estate, but she drifts away from the conversation.

Act Three
August 22, the day the estate is to be auctioned off. The drawing room next to the ballroom, where Lyubov is having a party, employing an orchestra she cannot afford to pay.

Lopakhin and Gayev return from the auction. Gayev didn’t have nearly enough money, and it looked like an outsider was going to buy the estate. So Lopakhin saved it by buying it himself! He plans to start chopping down the trees immediately: “We’ll build summer houses, and our grandchildren and great-grandchildren will see a new life here…”

Lopakhin can’t understand why people aren’t rejoicing, but Lyubov weeps for the loss of the orchard and the passing of the only life she knows. Anya comforts her mother, promising that they’ll make a new life (“plant a new orchard, more splendid than this…”) and be happy again.

Act Four
A cold, sunny morning in October. Back in the nursery. Everything is packed for the family’s departure.

Trofimov is heading back to the university in Moscow, where he is a perpetual student. Anya also is going to study, and there’s a slight chance that their idealistic love may flourish, although Trofimov has his eye on a more distant prize: “Humanity is moving toward a higher truth, to the greatest happiness possible on earth, and I am in the front ranks!”

Lyubov is going to Paris, back to the lover who deserted her. When Anya receives her degree, she’ll get a job so she can bring her mother back to Russia and support her.

Lyubov makes an opportunity for Varya and Lopakhin to tell each other how they feel, but they don’t; instead they go their separate ways, Lopakhin to his many business enterprises and Varya to be a housekeeper fifty miles away.

Last to leave are Gayev and Lyubov, who take a moment to grieve for their loss. “Oh, my sweet, my delicate, beautiful orchard! My life, my youth, my happiness, farewell! Farewell!”

The house is empty and locked, not to be entered again till spring. Then Firs appears, forgotten in the chaos of farewells. The stage directions tell us:

A distant sound can be heard, as if from the sky, the sound of a breaking string, dying down, mournfully. Silence sets in, and we can only hear, far away in the orchard, an axe tapping on a tree.

For Families: This subtle and sad comedy deals with mature issues and the day-to-day life of Russia at the end of the 19th Century. A theatre classic, this play is most likely to be enjoyed by young people 14 and up with some exposure to Chekhov’s world and language.