Oh Hedda! What have you done now? Hedda Gabler has been causing trouble since 1891 when Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen’s namesake play was first performed. Since then, it’s had various reincarnations, its latest, Hedda, lavishly reimagined by director Nia DaCosta from a queer perspective, takes place in high society at a beautiful country estate in 1950s England.

Hedda (Tessa Thompson) is a scheming trouble-maker who will stop at nothing to get what she wants. However, she’s not sure exactly what she wants. She has recently married handsome, mild-mannered George (Tom Bateman) – above her formerly bohemian status – and is living in a beautiful stately home, filled with cool art and furniture. She’s, however, in all aspects, already pretty unsatisfied with life with George. They’ve taken on a huge amount of debt from a friend, the manipulative Judge Roland (Nicholas Pinnock), to fund the house. This is a debt George, an academic, needs to service by gaining a vacant professorship and an endowment. Hedda decides they should host a huge party to celebrate their relationship, introduce their friends and associates to each other, and impress Professor Greenwood (Finbar Lynch), who will decide George’s academic future.

So far that seems like a good plan, but Hedda also invites Eileen (Nina Hoss), an ex-girlfriend of hers, unknown to the others, who is an alcoholic, sober for three months. The gorgeously busty and sensual Eileen arrives with a bunch of uninvited guests including her rather meek new girlfriend Thea (Imogen Poots), a woman Hedda had bullied at school, and David (Jamael Westman), a handsome cad. Eileen also has a manuscript with her and reveals she is also up for the professorship. This triggers Hedda and George who really need George to get the job. The slightly sleazy professor turns up with a much younger nubile girlfriend and the guests set to on a bacchanalian marathon of a party, full of sex, booze, drugs and bad behaviour. George desperately tries to maintain an air of civility for the professor, but Hedda has other, rather wild, ideas in mind to achieve their goals.

DaCosta’s reinvention works well. Presented as a five-act piece, we delight in seeing a house full of flawed characters ply their trades and ambitions all sullied by sex and substances. DaCosta’s script is full of great innuendo gems like ‘Hedda loves eating out’ abound – complementing a very arch dialogue. The extravagant production design, set decoration, and costumes aid a cinematography that makes you feel you are at a fabulous high society party. The cast is excellent, particularly Hoss as the damaged Eileen who spectacularly relapses on the booze under the manipulative guidance of naughty Hedda. Thompson’s rude, spontaneous, borderline-psychotic Hedda is also first-rate. She’s so wayward, but we want her to win. There are no life lessons to be learnt here, just guilty pleasures to be enjoyed. Lots of fun and shenanigans.

10/10