Madame Lyubov Ranevskaya returns to her estate in Russia after a long absence, but she has brought her troubled past with her. In fact all the characters in Chekhov’s masterpiece are haunted by their pasts, and it is making the present very difficult to deal with. They yearn for the past, as they do genuine human connection, and are unable to achieve either. They also can’t seem to confront the future. The estate is going to be sold and they can’t seem to wrap their minds around that. Chekhov’s wonderfully detailed characters hold a brutal mirror up to the human race, and they also make us laugh as we acknowledge how truly crazy we all are.