American playwright and director Richard Nelson is working in the Ukrainian capital for the third time in the past two years. This time, he is creating the play More Beauty Than Sorrow on the stage of the Kyiv Academic Drama Theatre in Podil. The news was reported by the publication Ukrainian Theatre.
The new production focuses on the figure of Lesya Ukrainka and her inner circle — but without pathos or a bronze halo. The authors present the Kosach family as individuals with their own weaknesses, anxieties and hopes, finding themselves at a moment of both historical and personal tension.
For Nelson, this work continues his exploration of early twentieth-century Ukrainian cultural history. Once again, the director adopts an intimate perspective: he is less interested in the official narrative of celebrated figures than in the texture of everyday life — fragile, vivid and marked by internal drama. In this space, according to his artistic vision, true beauty emerges — even when sorrow is close at hand.
In 2023, he staged the play The Michaels at the Podil Theatre — an intimate story about a family of artists reunited during a period of social upheaval. In the Ukrainian version, the production acquired particular resonance in the context of the full-scale war. Earlier, in 2022, Richard Nelson worked in Kyiv on a theatre project with Ukrainian actors that further developed his signature style — intimate family conversations set against the backdrop of historical turmoil. That collaboration marked the beginning of his deeper engagement with the Ukrainian cultural context.
The current production of More Beauty Than Sorrow effectively completes Nelson’s distinctive Kyiv trilogy — a cycle of works about intellectual families, art, and the fragility of human dignity in times of upheaval.