Rosamund Pike stars in Henrik Ibsen's classic Hedda Gabler. Tom ventures all the way to Richmond, and it's worth it.
Discreetly clad in crimson velvet frock coat, Rosamund Pike wields a pair of antique flintlock duelling pistols. Her blonde hair billows back, and her sharp green eyes are both penetrating and impenetrable. She's beautiful obviously, but also intense, elegant, wary, worried, coiled – ready to pounce, but unsure perhaps of the target. As promotional photographs go, this – for Henrik Ibsen's Hedda Gabler at Richmond Theatre – is a cracker.
Hedda Gabler is considered one of Ibsen's finest works, and certainly the eponymous heroine is a much-celebrated role, referred to by fans of the lazy comparison as “the female Hamlet”. The driving force of the entire play, each scene revolves around her.
The play opens the day after Doctor George Tesman (Robert Glenister), a dull but ambitious academic, returns from his honeymoon with Hedda (Pike), daughter of a distinguished general and the city's most notable beauty. Largely consisting of Tesman and his ageing Aunt Juliana (an entertainingly over-enthusiastic Abba Carteret), the scene is dominated by Hedda's absence. Old maid Berta (a put-upon Janet Whiteside) and Juliana (or 'Juju' as Tesman fawningly refer to her) fuss and fiddle and worry that things might not be quite to Hedda's taste. And with good reason.
Rosamund Pike's arrival as Hedda is quite something: grand, bored, stately, tasteful – ever-poised, and completely unreadable, Pike's is a magical, utterly engrossing performance. She's so far removed from the dull bookishness of her husband, and despite chatting amiably with Judge Brack (Tim McInnery) who combines his usual pompous bumbling with something more calculating and sinister, it's clear she's dangerously bored.
The news of the reappearance of Tesman's old rival Ejlert Loevborg (a slightly melodramatic Colin Tierney) gets everyone worried. He's a brilliant academic, but also a boozing wastrel. Prompted by Hedda, Loevborg goes out drinking and loses the manuscript for the book that promises both to make his name and to steal the professorship from Tesman (thereby preventing him from providing the wealth he'd promised to Hedda). The manuscript falls into Hedda's hands, but rather than inform Loevborg, she instead persuades him to go off and shoot himself. Despite her constant machinations, things don't quite turn out as Hedda might have anticipated...
Ibsen's play is bizarre – it's stilted and melodramatic, and the motives of the characters rarely make much sense. The audience can never be certain as to Hedda's intentions and this is what makes her such a fascinating character.
It's also rigorously structured – the two relationship triangles at one point neatly arranged on stage with Hedda of course the interlinking centre – and the mannered acting works brilliantly. All of these characters are themselves always acting – manners, lies, deception, even their very identities are elaborately self-conscious performances. It's all neatly encapsulated by the motif of Hedda's piano playing. Obscured by a screen, all the audience can see is her silhouette, John Miers-esque and dark against a crimson wall. It is but an image of an action – a double performance from a doubly complex individual.
Hedda Gabler runs at Richmond Theatre until 20th March
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