TEHRAN – Stage director and actress Shiva Ordui, who is also a translator of literary compositions, has made her screen debut with a short film based on Anton Chekhov’s short story “Misery”.

The film entitled “Pause” has been written and co-produced by Ordui.

Omid Mohammadnejad, Raha Khodayari, Yasser Asghari, Ehsan Sadeqi, Parsa Arainejad, Mohammad Shami, Alireza Amani and Nirvana Yusefi star in the short film.  

A press release published on Thursday by “Pause” public relations gave no details about the story of the short movie. 

“Misery” was first published in Peterburgskaya Gazeta’s No. 26 issue on January 16, 1886. With minor changes, it appeared in the Motley Stories collection. 

In 1895, it made its way into an anthology called Probleski. In a slightly revised version, Chekhov included it into Volume 3 of his Collected Works published by Adolf Marks in 1899–1901.

The short is about the cabman Iona, whose son has recently died. He desperately and unsuccessfully tries to have a talk with the people he meets and tell them how shattered he is. He ends up talking to his horse.

The story was positively reviewed by Peterburgskiye Vedomosti and N. Ladozhsky. 

Leonid Obolensky, writing for Russkoye Bogatstvo, praised Chekhov for his extraordinary ability to see the hidden drama behind deceptively simple things, and cited “Misery” as a perfect example of that. 

In an 1887 essay called “The Writers of Our Times”, Konstantin Arsenyev included “Misery” on his list of the best contemporary short stories. 

Leo Tolstoy included “Misery” into his personal list of Chekhov’s best stories.

Photo: A scene from the short film “Pause” by Shiva Ordui. 

MMS/YAW