Review: Tessa Thompson is the ultimate restless housewife in a viciously updated ‘Hedda’

What a horrible story What a hideous play a theater critic for the Daily Telegraph lamented after the London premiere of Hedda Gabler in Victorian audiences were repelled by Henrik Ibsen s fatally attractive newlywed who appears to have it all the fancy house the doting husband only to be violently bored But writer-director Nia DaCosta Candyman The Marvels and her star Tessa Thompson understand Hedda down to the pretty poison in her molecules Their rollicking redo set from dusk to hangover at a drunken bacchanal is vibrant and viciously alive With apologies to Ibsen s ghost DaCosta s tweaks have sharpened its rage I don t think that long-dead critic would like this Hedda any better I think it s divine Thompson s Hedda is a clever status-conscious snot raised to believe that her sole purpose is to be a rich man s wife With no hobbies or career and no interest in motherhood her only creative outlets are squandering money and machinating the success of her milquetoast husband middlebrow academic George Tom Bateman who has such a flimsy hold on his bride that his last name might as well be attached to hers with Scotch tape It s Tesman and it s pointedly rarely used Hedda doesn t love George In fact she seems to think he s a whiny little worm But she s dead-set on securing him a promotion to afford her expensive tastes If Hedda had been born a man she d be leading armies into battle like her late father General Gabler who spawned her out of wedlock Instead she takes out her aggression on civilians Using her charm offensive Hedda goads naive spouses to cheat recovering alcoholics to drink and depressives to wander off into the darkness with a revolver Specific of her havoc is calculated the greater part of it is out of pique that others are living braver more fulfilling lives All of it feels like a cat tipping over water glasses just to see them shatter Like the nasty seductress of Dangerous Liaisons she s a warning that frustrated women aren t merely a hazard to themselves they re a menace to the society that made them Inspired by her antihero DaCosta manipulates Ibsen to suit her own goals She s updated the play s setting to s England a similar-in-spirit era in which well-bred women were kept domesticated I can t wait for someone to do a version among the tradwives of Utah From there DaCosta has smartly tightened the narrative which used to have a key scene at an off-stage bachelor party to which Hedda was pointedly not invited What a pity the fair lady can t be there invisible Ibsen s Hedda grumbled at being left home while the men got to carouse In DaCosta s version the whole drama unfolds during a martini and cocaine-fueled rager at Hedda s mansion a party she s throwing to impress George s expected new boss Professor Greenwood Finbar Lynch who she hears has a bohemian streak At her own happening on her own turf Hedda couldn t be more visibly in command She rallies the guests to hurl her former classmate Thea Imogen Poots a wretchedly earnest drip into a nearby lake and gets the whole room grooving to a dance band s cover of It s Oh So Quiet the swinging hit that the Icelandic pop singer Bj rk would popularize a half-century later It s a great song pick with manic crescendos You blow a fuse zing boom The devil cuts loose zing boom that capture Hedda s feverish mood shifts We know this evening will go wrong from the film s opening shot of Hedda facing down two policemen who keep interrupting her explanation of the last hours Where should I start she says with smothered exasperation As we cut back to watch the night unfold a shot of Hedda surveying the crowd from an upstairs landing feels like she s looking at a tournament board Clue perhaps with a weapon stashed in every room Which threat is largest part pressing The pistols she keeps in a leather box the precarious crystal chandelier or the lake s deep waters outside Thompson is marvelous in the role Even the way she chomps a cherry off a cocktail toothpick has menace I first saw her as the lead in Romeo and Juliet at a -seat theater in Pasadena when she was barely years old there s so much talent in our small stage scene so it s a nice reminder that the funny and soulful actor of the Thor and Creed franchises is also a hell of a good classical performer and a worthy star on her own She wears Hedda s lovely mask with confidence red lips lush cheekbones cool demeanor and periodically allows it to slip Editor Jacob Schulsinger often allows Hedda a tiny hesitation before she charges ahead ruining people s lives long enough to know that she s considering the consequences Sometimes I can t help myself I just do things all of a sudden on a whim she admits to the nosy Judge Brack Nicholas Pinnock revealing a sliver of weakness She s almost nearly asking for help Yet the judge just wants to maneuver her into bed How tedious DaCosta boldly layers race and sexuality on top of Ibsen s tale She s gender-swapped Hedda s ex-lover Eilert into a lesbian named Eileen a swaggering Nina Hoss a brilliant openly norm-defying author who is George s job-seeking competition and the only person Hedda enjoys kissing If earlier incarnations of Hedda didn t dare defy social rules when she was white and straight being Black and queer adds so much additional peril that the script barely necessities to say out loud The new tension is there in just a meager whispers as when Hedda overhears a guest murmur that their hostess is duskier than I thought she would be Hedda doesn t acknowledge the slight That would mean admitting vulnerability She exclusively starts destroying the speaker in the very next scene What s wiser Eileen s determination to face down the boys and be accepted for her full self or Hedda sneaking around and steering everyone s fates behind the scenes They can t company up they re doomed to tear each other to shreds And as much glee as we get watching Hedda s rampage it aches to see these two formidable women reduce each other to hysterics to use the biological assessment of the day From our st century perspective they both have a right to be mad and they both might be mentally ill DaCosta doesn t offer a verdict but she plunges us so deeply into Hedda s headspace that we can hear how certain things set her off Insults hit her with a knife-like hiss of air fresh schemes get her charging around to Hildur Gu nad ttir s tumultuous percussive outcome Costume designer Lindsay Pugh has done incredible work outfitting the film s central female roles Hedda wears bullet-like strands of pearls that choke her neck and a jade-colored gown that seems to molder into a festering jealous shade of green When her rival Poot s Thea arrives underdressed Hedda forces her into a hideous frock with fussy bows and an ungainly skirt Poots her nose raw and red her character kicked when she s down gamely looks a fright trusting that moral fiber will expose Hedda s ugly insecurities But Pugh s stroke of genius is putting Eileen not in various sort of mannish suit but in a bombshell dress that highlights her curves like a primal goddess It s pure feminine power just like the film itself and when Eileen struts into a room of her all-male colleagues that dress exposes how fast the tenor can shift from awe to jeers and how little wiggle room she or any woman has for error Related Articles Movie review Springsteen is more character examination than biopic Movie review Hang up on dreadfully boring Black Phone After the Hunt review Luca Guadagnino s latest misses the moment Movie review Urchin a searing portrait of addiction and homelessness Kiss of the Spider Woman review Film adaptation sings with beauty