Emily Brontë

“Wuthering Heights”

15/02/26

Cineworld, Edinburgh

I’ll be the first to admit: I’m not the biggest fan of Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights. I love its complexity, its uncompromising depiction of broken people and the wildness at its heart, but it just doesn’t speak to me as clearly as, say, Jane Eyre, Villette or The Tenant of Wildefell Hall. I’m not denying the author’s genius, but – for me – there are too many narrative layers between the reader and the central story; I don’t want the Lockwood and Nelly Dean filters. And, let’s be honest, it’s all a bit histrionic, isn’t it?

Emerald Fennell certainly leans into the melodrama in this sumptuous adaptation, and she’s sensibly expunged Lockwood (whatever purpose he serves on the page, it doesn’t translate well to film). However, some of the other changes are genuinely baffling. It’s like she’s made an adaptation of an earlier movie rather than the novel. It’s also like – dare I say it? – she doesn’t really get the book.

Let’s start with the most glaring problem: Heathcliff. He’s played by two perfectly competent actors: first Owen Cooper and then, in a sudden age-defying leap, Jacob Elordi. There’s no problem with their performances but, let’s face it, neither is right for the part – and not just because Elordi is a decade too old.

They’re white; Heathcliff isn’t.

While I’m not someone who expects screen adaptations to be exact replicas of their source material, I do think that something as fundamental to the character as Heathcliff’s race can’t simply be erased. His outsider status stems from the fact that he is visibly different from those around him; he is deemed an unsuitable match for Cathy because of his unknown ethnicity. Racism is the reason he’s rejected. It matters that he’s found at the Liverpool docks and not just the village pub. He’s persona non grata from the start. It also seems an odd decision to cast British Pakistani, Shazad Latif, as Edgar Linton. Why not swap the two leads?

What’s more, Fennell bottles out when it comes to Heathcliff’s monstrosity. She depicts him as a romantic hero, but that’s the antithesis of what Brontë wrote. The novel’s Heathcliff is a nuanced character, at once sexy, pitiful, admirable and monstrous. Like Frankenstein’s creature (a better casting for Elordi), we are shown the trauma that destroys him, but we also see the nasty brute that he becomes. Fennell’s iteration lets him off the hook: he’s not cruel or abusive, just too deeply in love. Making Isabella (Alison Oliver)’s degradation consensual is horribly tin-eared, especially the moment Heathcliff demonstrates that she could easily get away if she wanted to. I don’t think you need to be particularly socially aware to know that “Why doesn’t she just leave?” is a harmful, victim-blaming trope when it comes to domestic violence.

Leaving aside the obvious issue with Fennell deciding to omit the second half of the story, there are two further choices I need to question. First, why has Hindley been deleted from the tale? His role is shared between Mr Earnshaw (Martin Clunes) and Nelly Dean (Hong Chau): the former physically abuses Heathcliff, while the latter is jealous after being displaced in Cathy’s affections, and neither response rings true. And second, why doesn’t Cathy’s baby live? One of Wuthering Heights‘ main themes is emotional inheritance – but there’s nobody here to represent the next generation. It seems a glaring loss.

Novel aside, there are also some problems with the film itself. Everything is so over-the-top that it’s hard to take seriously. From Isabella’s “ribbon room” to Mr Earnshaw’s ridiculous alcohol-bottle mountains (never mind that he’s famously broke, glass was expensive back then and he’d have been more likely to get his booze in a refillable ceramic jug), there’s no subtlety here at all.

Is there anything to like? Yes. Charlotte Mellington and Margot Robbie both play Cathy well, although – like Elordi – Robbie is way too old for the role (Cathy is only supposed to be 18 when she dies, and Robbie is almost double that). The intensity of Cathy and Heathcliff’s relationship is convincingly drawn, and I love the black, red and white colour palette. The moors are perfectly windswept and gloomy, and the portrayal of an impoverished gentry clinging to its name is clear-eyed and unsentimental. I also quite like the music, with a score by Anthony Willis and an album’s worth of original songs by Charli XCX.

But, in the end, that’s not enough. This feels like a wasted opportunity from a young director whose blind spots have thwarted her passion project.

2.5 stars

Susan Singfield

Wuthering Heights

25/05/22

King’s Theatre, Edinburgh

I can’t think of a better match than Emily Brontë and Emma Rice: two renegade spirits, purveyors of verve and rebellion; two flawed geniuses, whose work is – love it or loathe it – undeniably compelling.

In this Wise Children production, Rice strips Wuthering Heights down to its beating heart, illuminates its essence. Anyone familiar with Rice’s previous work (at Kneehigh, for example) will know to expect a chaotic, frenzied telling, a stage so bursting with life and energy that it’s sometimes hard to know where to look. And that’s what we get. It’s dazzling; it’s dizzying – and I adore it. This is the sort of theatre that excites me.

Instead of Nelly Dean, we have The Moor, the landscape personified as a Greek chorus, whose Leader (Nandhe Bhebhe) narrates and placates, while her acolytes sing and dance their embodiments of weather, conscience and commentary. It’s a bold move, but it works. The setting is integral to Brontë’s novel; why not bring it to life? It’s also a neat way of conveying the labyrinthine plot in a mere three hours, so that we’re never in any doubt about who’s who, or how they’re all related, despite the too-similar names and the double-roles.

Adding to the bustle and busyness, there’s a live band on stage throughout (Sid Goldsmith, Nadine Lee and Pat Moran), as well as some stunning back projection, depicting turbulent skies and flocks of birds, which soar noisily into the clouds whenever someone dies. Rice’s signature puppetry puts in a brief appearance too, as the infant cuckoo, Heathcliff, lands in the Wuthering nest.

Rice foregrounds the differences between the Earnshaws and the Lintons: Hindley (Tama Phethean), Cathy (Lucy McCormick) and Heathcliff (Liam Tamne) are played as dark, almost monstrous figures, while Edgar (Sam Archer) and Isabella (Katy Owen) are light and clownish. This unevenness of tone serves to highlight how very dangerous the Earnshaws are, and it’s almost unbearable to witness the silly, foppish Lintons veer into their orbit, knowing that every encounter takes them closer to sealing their own dreadful fates. Owen garners many laughs with her cartoonish depiction of adolescent naïvety – she’s a gifted comedian – but Isabella is a petulant shrew in a tiger’s paw, and this is clearer here than in any other adaptation I have seen.

Emily Brontë purists will hate this show; it’ll give ’em the heeby-jeebies. But there’s a row of teenagers sitting behind me at the theatre tonight – they’re on a school trip – and they love it. I can hear them laughing and gasping, even exclaiming out loud. And Wuthering Heights is a YA book, isn’t it? A cautionary tale about a very, very toxic relationship, all raging hormones and melodrama, perfectly encapsulated on this anarchic stage.

5 stars

Susan Singfield