Review: 'A Month in the Country' Blends Comedy and Heartache at Donmar Warehouse

A new staging of Brian Friel's version of Ivan Turgenev's "A Month in the Country" is currently running at the Donmar Warehouse in London, according to a review by The Guardian.

The Guardian's review describes the production as treading "lightly between humour and hurt" while depicting "wayward passions" that disrupt life in a country house. The story, the review notes, centers on a woman unhappy in her marriage, a confidante secretly in love with her, and a young charge who falls for a new tutor, alongside other characters caught in a web of unrequited affection.

According to the review, Turgenev's mid-19th-century play, set in rural Russia, is seen as a precursor to the tragicomic style later associated with Anton Chekhov. The Guardian states that Friel's adaptation, described in the review as a script "after Turgenev," is written with enough delicacy that it feels both rooted in its historical period and reflective of a more timeless narrative about love and marriage.

The review characterizes the drama as functioning simultaneously as comedy and quiet tragedy, with broadly drawn, entertaining characters existing alongside moments of anguish and rejection. The Guardian also draws a connection between this play's mood and Friel's own later work, "Dancing at Lughnasa," written two years afterward in 1990, suggesting a subtle influence of Turgenev's pining tone on Friel's later writing.

The review was published by The Guardian's Culture desk on September 3, 2026.