A barrage of sound mixes rain, distant voices and a heavenly choir. Light flashes, an electric lamp swings wildly above a woman dressed in black, wearing a white apron, who is sitting behind a table. Around her rise three gloomy, dark walls, punctuated by elongated openings; above her, a shadowed balcony runs the length of the back wall. This is the world of Emily Brontë’s 1847 novel as conceived by director Lucinka Eisler and writer Ben Lewis (both founding members of theatre company Inspector Sands, co-producer, here, with Royal & Derngate, China Plate and Oxford Playhouse).
The woman at the table scrapes a carrot with a large knife: Nelly the housekeeper (Giulia Innocenti, also a founder member of Inspector Sands) is at the centre of what seems to be a sort of police procedural. When characters appear, their photographs are pinned to the back wall, as if to a suspects board; when they die, they remove their photos as they exit (six actors play 11 roles). A disembodied voice interrogates Nelly: “Who is the monster?” When she replies, “Heathcliff”, it challenges her. Why is she taking his wages instead of leaving for another job? She must, the voice commands, “Tell the story!”
Heathcliff (Ike Bennett) is introduced as a “rescued slave” and treated brutally. The story progresses chaotically; characters and relationships are two-dimensional; class distinctions are comic-book crass. “Interrogator” figures identify Nelly as a spinster, as childless; they accuse her of trying to take the children in the story for her own, of ruining their lives. Is she, they say, the real monster?
The overall impression is of a storm of ideas struggling to find dramatic definition. This is a shame. Simple moments, where the action connects with the novel, work well: Lua Bairstow as Catherine, describing her love for Heathcliff; the growing rapport between John Askew’s Hareton and Nicole Sawyerr’s Young Cathy. They are too few.
Wuthering Heights is at Royal & Derngate, Northampton until 6 May, then touring until 10 June
