What gives the play depth, what rescues it from being another light-hearted farce of the sort that Chekhov had composed up until then, is the inversion of its structure onto itself. The Seagull is a play about theatre, as much as it is a play being performed in a theater (Note the difference in spelling). By virtue of the "play within a play" that initiates it, The Seagull sets up an infinite regress, a play (about a play (about a play (within a play (about a play ... on theatre (about theatre (on theatre (about...))))! Within the conventional elements, both comic and tragic, one finds a deeper human dimension, derived from the relationship of theatre to life.