The Seagull on the Sims 4 by Celine Song (review)

The Russian writer and doctor Anton Chekhov lived a life marked by infectious diseases and health crises. Chekhov suffered and died from tuberculosis, an illness that reached epidemic levels in the nineteenth century, killing one in seven people. He regularly treated patients during cholera outbreaks. And his Uncle Vanya begins with Doctor Astrov describing the horrors of a typhus epidemic. It is not surprising then that in the COVID-19 era, many theatre artists have turned to Chekhov’s works. From audio broadcasts to Zoom readings, the Chekhovian leitmotifs of isolation, existential despair, and economic precarity resonate not as Russian soul clichés, but rather as the undeniable realities of a contingent and vulnerable world. The most successful of these works has been Canadian playwright Celine Song’s The Seagull on The Sims 4. Combining theatrical elements with video-game gimmicks, this experimental work answered Konstantin Treplev’s call for new forms. Song not only effectively captured Chekhov’s dramatic world in the virtual realm, but also fostered a sense of community, collaboration, and liveness at a time of isolation and social distancing. Her Seagull shows the path toward more accessible theatre (when I re-watched the archived production in early December, the first night’s performance had garnered over 11,000 views). Song’s achievement in remote theatre will no doubt continue to inspire digital performances for years to come.

Described by the New York Theatre Workshop as a “durational installation art piece,” Song’s impressive adaptation transposed Chekhov’s comedy onto the digital platform of the popular life-simulation video game, The Sims. This is not the first time that a Chekhov play has been adapted in a video game. In June 2020, the Tovstonogov Bolshoi Drama Theater in St. Petersburg, Russia presented an abridged version of The Cherry Orchard in the online game Mine-craft, where actors voiced the avatars. Compared to that rushed version, The Seagull on The Sims 4 was a more absorbing and dynamic experience, even as it took almost six hours stretched over two evenings. What viewers saw when they tuned into Twitch TV was Song building the characters and world of The Seagull and then steering the plot. Since avatars in The Sims speak a fictional language (Simlish) and their dialogue cannot be programmed in advance, we did not get to hear Chekhov’s text. Instead, Song quoted the play’s famous sayings, commented on the actions of her avatars, and discussed every scene with us in great detail so that the show became a performance of our communal knowledge of Chekhov.

Celine Song in The Seagull on The Sims 4 (Treplev and Death). (Photo: Courtesy of New York Theatre Workshop.)

Watching Song’s Seagull, I felt as though I was part of an artistic community at work on a theatre production. Audience members got to collaborate in the creative process through the chat function. Participants could chime in about almost every aspect of the show, from minute costume choices to larger questions of interpretation. Like Song herself, who frequently made perceptive remarks about The Seagull, most viewers knew Chekhov’s oeuvre inside and out, cracking theatre jokes and offering both silly and sound dramaturgical advice. For example, when Song rotated the different attire options for Treplev’s avatar, the viewers chose black skinny jeans, a tight skull T-shirt, trendy rectangular glasses, and a well-cultivated goatee. Song speculated that Treplev was one of the first “Incels” (“involuntary celibates”), while one viewer imagined Treplev talking for hours about David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest. When Arkadina’s turn came, we debated whether a white or pink dress would look more garish. Selecting personality traits often led to debates. Is Treplev a genius or does he just want to be a successful writer? Part of the fun was hearing the different interpretations of the play, including those of playwrights Aleshea Harris...