On 4 October 2022, The Chekhov International Theatre Festival marks its 30th anniversary. The Festival was established by the International Confederation of Theatre Unions and launched on 4 and 5 October 1992 at the Mossovet Theatre (with a production of Schiller's "Intrigue and Love" by the Bolshoi Drama Theatre, directed by Temur Chkheidze, featuring Kirill Lavrov).
Any anniversary is not only a celebration but also an occasion for taking stock. Since its founding, the Festival has presented over 600 performances from 54 countries around the world. These include works by 437 directors, choreographers and music directors: Bartabas, Pina Bausch, Luc Bondy, Matthew Bourne, Peter Brook, Ivo van Hove, Heiner Goebbels, Emma Dante, Sergey Danchenko, Declan Donnellan, Emmanuelle Demarcy-Mota, Dominique Drumege, Nacho Duato, Philippe Genty, Jo Kanamori, Merce Cunningham, Romeo Castellucci, Frank Castorf, Otomar Krejča, Robert Lepage, LIN Hwai-min, Christian Lüp, Simon McBurney, Christoph Marthaler, Satoshi Miyagi, Ariane Mnouchkine, Joseph Nadj, Eimuntas Nekrošius, Maria Pagés, Olivier Py, Luca Ronconi, Giorgio Strehler, Robert Sturua, Tadashi Suzuki, James Thiérrée, Robert Wilson, Daniele Finzi Pasca, Akram Khan, Patrice Chéreau, Peter Stein, Andrei Șerban, Mats Ek, Jerzy Jarocki, and many others.
The Moscow Programme has always occupied a significant place in the Chekhov Festival's line‑up. Since 1992, over 250 performances have been presented within this programme. Typically, these are premieres from the two seasons preceding each Festival, staged by directors of different generations. It is of great importance to the Festival that participants and guests – directors, actors, festival directors and producers – have the opportunity to discover the most interesting new productions from Moscow theatres. Over the years, the Moscow Programme has featured works by Alexey Borodin, Marina Brusnikina, Yuri Butusov, Anatoly Vasiliev, Kama Ginkas, Oleg Yefremov, Sergey Zhenovach, Mark Zakharov, Alexey Kazantsev, Evgeny Kamenkovich, Mindaugas Karbauskis, Roman Kozak, Grigory Kozlov, Andrey Konchalovsky, Dmitry Krymov, Yuri Lyubimov, Evgeny Marcelli, Vladimir Mirzoev, Boris Morozov, Vladimir Pankov, Evgeny Pisarev, Yuri Pogrebnichko, Konstantin Raikin, Iosif Raikhelgauz, Viktor Ryzhakov, Kirill Serebrennikov, Oleg Tabakov, Alexander Titel, Rimas Tuminas, Valery Fokin, Pyotr Fomenko, Pavel Khomsky, Nina Chusova, Adolf Shapiro, Boris Yukhananov, Henrietta Yanovskaya, and many others.
The Festival's Educational Programme traditionally offers a series of free events for students, theatre professionals and the general public: masterclasses, lectures, laboratories led by renowned theatre practitioners, and meet‑the‑artist sessions.
Since 2011, the Chekhov Festival, together with the Regional Public Foundation for the Support of The Chekhov International Theatre Festival, has been running a programme to present Festival productions in the regions of Russia. In 24 cities (Voronezh, Yekaterinburg, Kazan, Kaliningrad, Lipetsk, Nizhny Novgorod, Novosibirsk, Omsk, Perm, Pskov, Pushkin Hills, Ryazan, Samara, St Petersburg, Saratov, Sochi, Tolyatti, Tyumen, Ufa, Ulyanovsk, Khanty-Mansiysk, Chelyabinsk, Yalta, Yaroslavl), more than 40 productions have been staged. Audiences have seen performances by outstanding figures of world theatre: Peter Brook, Anatoly Vasiliev, Declan Donnellan, Philippe Genty, LIN Hwai-min, Ohad Naharin, Giorgio Strehler, Robert Sturua, Aurélia and James Thiérrée‑Chaplin, Daniele Finzi Pasca, William Forsythe, and many others.
The Chekhov Festival also acts as producer of new productions involving leading theatres and directors from Russia and around the world. A total of 36 productions have been created, 14 of which were dedicated to the 150th anniversary of A.P. Chekhov's birth. The Festival's productions and co-productions have worthily represented Russian theatre at the most prestigious international festivals and forums.
On several occasions, the Chekhov Festival has organised large‑scale international theatre projects outside its regular festival programmes, and these have become important milestones in the development of cultural ties between Russia and other countries. In 2012, the Festival organised a tour of the Royal Shakespeare Company (UK); in 2014, as part of the UK–Russia Year of Culture, it presented a programme of British theatres. In September 2018, the Chekhov Festival acted as the Russian organiser of the tour of Japan's Shochiku Grand Kabuki Chikamatsu‑za, which became the centrepiece of the Japan–Russia Year of Culture programme.
In September 2018, as part of Moscow City Day celebrations organised by the Moscow Government, the Chekhov Festival presented a large international street theatre programme – offering free performances by companies from around the world in open‑air venues. The marathon featured leading names in street theatre, including Fura dels Baus and Xarxa Teatre from Spain.
Over the years, the Chekhov Festival has hosted Japanese Seasons in Russia, a Brazilian Season, a Canadian Theatre Season, and return seasons of Russian theatre in those countries. The Chekhov Festival also organised the Russian programme at the Avignon Festival, the Europalia Russia festival in Belgium, the cultural programme for Russia's National Days at EXPO (Nagoya, Japan and Zaragoza, Spain), and many other theatre and cultural initiatives.
The Festival places great emphasis on working with young theatre practitioners from Russia, the CIS countries, the Baltic states and Georgia. Laboratories for young directors from these countries are regularly held during the festival period. Since 2012, the International Confederation of Theatre Unions has organised the Youth Theatre Forum of the CIS, Baltic and Georgia countries. The Forum took place in Chisinau in 2012, in Minsk in 2015, in Yerevan in 2018, and in Tashkent in 2021. The winners of the Forum become participants in the Chekhov Festival, receiving a unique opportunity to present their work at one of the world's largest theatre showcases.
Since 2021, the Chekhov Festival, together with the State Theatre of Nations, has been the organiser of the International Pacific Theatre Festival. The Festival takes place in Vladivostok on a biennial basis, as part of the programme for the development of theatre arts in the Far East. The initiator of the programme is Evgeny Mironov. The concept of the Festival was created by Valery Shadrin. The aim of the International Pacific Theatre Festival is to introduce audiences to the finest productions from the Pacific region and other countries around the world. In addition to performances, an open educational programme – featuring creative meetings, lectures and post‑show discussions – is offered to the city's residents.
The Festival and its projects have traditionally enjoyed the support of the Government of the Russian Federation, the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation, the Moscow Department of Culture, regional ministries of culture, and governmental and non‑governmental organisations from participating countries.