Hedda Gabler, Glasgow review - 'so spellbinding that some in the audience could be heard gasping'

Hedda Gabler, Bard in the Botanics, Glasgow *****

Jane Eyre, Bard in the Botanics, Glasgow ****

A couple of months ago, she was playing Zinnie Harris’s version of Lady Macbeth in New York, where she won a Drama Desk nomination for Best Performance. And now here she is in the Kibble Palace, within breathing distance of her home Glasgow audience, delivering a Hedda Gabler so spellbinding that some in the audience could be heard gasping and protesting, as – in a fit of destructive rage – she consigns the manuscript of her former lover’s new book to the fire, along with all his hopes, and those of his new love, Thea.

Nicole Cooper in the title role in Kathy McKean's version of Hedda Gabler, with James Boal as Judge Brack PIC: Tommy Ka-Ken Wan

The Bard In The Botanics star Nicole Cooper has become one of Scotland’s great leading actors, over the last decade; and so it’s more than fitting that the Bard In The Botanics season should open with another blazing performance from her, in one of the greatest of all female roles. The season is titled “Her Infinite Variety”, in a quote from Antony And Cleopatra; and in search of great classic stories of female experience, artistic director Gordon Barr has reached beyond the company’s usual Shakespeare remit, to encompass both Ibsen’s mighty 1891 drama, and the season’s other opening production, a new stage adaptation by associate director Jennifer Dick of Charlotte Bronte’s 1847 novel Jane Eyre.

This version of Hedda – played out in the suitably 19th century setting of the Kibble Palace – is directed by Barr himself, and brings together the team of Nicole Cooper and writer Kathy McKean that gave us a memorable Medea, in 2022. Performed over 110 minutes without an interval, McKean’s version opens slowly, with Isabella Joss as Aunt Julia and Sam Stopford’s excellent George Tesman – Hedda’s new husband – scene-setting in the drawing room of their splendid new home.

As soon as Cooper’s Hedda appears, though, the stage begins to thrum with tension, as her furious sense of entrapment in her new role as wife to a boring academic, and future mother of his children (she is pregnant, although reluctant to admit it), gradually draws not only Hedda, but all five main characters – including manipulative neighbour Judge Brack, a subtly terrifying James Boal – into a vortex of darkness. Playful, cruel, and savagely envious of those with the courage to defy the social conventions that have defined her upper-class life, this Hedda is nonetheless difficult to hate, so obvious is the pure desperation behind her viciousness; and if her tragedy lies in her inability to turn her frustrated fury to creation rather than destruction, the rage itself is somehow all too recognisable, even today.

Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, heroine of her 1847 novel, is superficially a very different character from the glamorous, aristocratic and beautiful Hedda Gabler; a mousy and penniless little orphan, with nothing to offer the world but her sharp intelligence. Yet in truth, Hedda and Jane are in many ways heroines cut from the same mould; women too restless in spirit, and too eager to live, love, and stand alongside men as equals, to easily tolerate the attitudes of 19th century society.

In Jennifer Dick’s two-and-a half-hour outdoor version of the story – set in 19th century Scotland – Stephanie McGregor delivers a superb performance as Jane; funny, rebellious, passionate in her quest for true love and connection, and yet always, unlike Hedda, wise enough to know when only patience, hard work, and a deliberate turning towards the light, will offer any way forward.

In a richly rewarding evening, McGregor receives terrific support from Tinashe Warikandwa, Trish Mullin, Stephen Arden and Alan Steele, with a breathtakingly handsome Johnny Panchaud as her love Rochester. And throughout, in a fascinating twist, Jennifer Dick makes much of Jane’s quiet gift for drawing and sketching; raising questions about whether Ibsen’s Hedda might not have found a happier ending, if she had been able – like Jane – to find a creative outlet which she could take seriously, as a way of working through, and surviving, the worst of pain and loss.

Both shows at Botanic Gardens, Glasgow, until 6 July.