Pride and Prejudice
- Robert Beale
- Jun 11
- 3 min read
Kate Hamill, after Jane Austen
Octagon Theatre Bolton co-production with Theatre by the Lake Keswick, Stephen Joseph Theatre Scarborough and Hull Truck Theatre, and in association with Theatr Clwyd
Octagon Theatre Bolton
June 5-28, 2025: 2 hrs 40 mins
(Also at Stephen Joseph Theatre Scarborough, July 3-26; Theatre by the Lake, Keswick, August 7- September 6; Hull Truck Theatre, September 18-October 11, and Theatr Clywd, October 15-25)
The clue is in the strapline – “Jane Austen’s sparkling romantic comedy”. You didn’t know that she wrote rom-coms? Well, this is definitely rom-com, with the emphasis on the com.
Pride and Prejudice played for laughs, with a dash of “ah …” sentimentality at the end, is what American writer Kate Hamill’s adaptation offers, and it’s what Lotte Wakeham’s production gives you in its UK premiere. After all, we all know the story, and we know the characters too, so why not enjoy some jokes as it goes along and wait for the inevitable happy ending?
There will undoubtedly be packed houses and constantly happy theatregoers on a North of England tour that’s going to keep its actors in employment almost to the end of October.
As one audience member said to her friend on the way in: “She doesn’t like him; then she does”. That’s all you need to know. It's a sign of the times that a cast of nine is considered large these days, and in this adaptation they take 16 roles between them, so other than Lizzie (Rosa Hesmondhalgh), her mum (Joanna Holden) and Mr D’Arcy (James Sheldon), everyone has more than one role to perform and there are some quick costume changes. Eve Pereira is both Mr Bingley and Mary Bennet; Ben Fensome is both Mr Collins and Mr Wickham; Jessica Ellis is both 14-year-old Lydia Bennet and the elderly Lady Catherine De Bourgh.
It all builds into an atmosphere of near-farce, with a dash of send-up of the classic costume dramas of Jane Austen we’ve come to know and love, though some details are frankly just puzzling. Why the repeated references to Donne’s “Send not to know for whom the bell tolls…” lines, with their funereal context, when wedding bells are the kind we’re thinking of? Why the repeated use of “You cannot be serious!” as Lizzie fends off a suitor; is she a kind of female John McEnroe? Much is made of the word “punch”, when it’s served as a drink, to enable various people to take a joshing swipe at each other, so there’s slapstick in it, too. And plenty of children’s-cartoonish “Waaah!” shouts when people realise someone’s right next to them: of course it always gets a laugh.
Most of the cast adopt Northern vowels and accentuations (but not all: Mrs Bennet does, Mr Bennet doesn’t; Mr Collins does; Mr Wickham doesn’t), but that can’t consistently be about either class or intelligence, so what does it mean? And don’t get me started on the anachronisms of Mary, the pianist, coming out with Beethoven’s Fifth, Chopin’s Funeral March and Wagner’s Bridal March when none of them had been written yet.
While some of the characterisations are nicely observed and subtly differentiated (Kiara Nicole Pillai as both Charlotte Lucas and Caroline Bingley, for instance, and Aamira Challenger as Jane Bennet, though I hope she’ll big up the dreamy Romantic in her as time goes on), others work over-much at contrasting their part-time roles when the costume changes do it for them anyway. James Sheldon, however, is good at impersonating Colin Firth’s classic Mr D’Arcy, and I don’t blame him for that.
But there is one really excellent, characterful performance: Rosa Hesmondhalgh’s Lizzie Bennet. The story is all about her (though Joanna Holden tries hard to make it about her mother), and, against the odds, she had me believing in it. That, in the end, is what matters, and she carries the show.
More info and tickets here (Bolton), or the other theatres' websites
