Gate Theatre, Dublin
There is a striking moment in Alan Stanford’s new production of
Jane Eyre
, where three incarnations of the heroine stand in a row like Russian dolls; warped reflections of each other. At the front of the stage stands the determined orphaned child (Lisa Lyons), behind her the forthright young woman (Andrea Corr), and towards the rear, with a stoic smile on her face, the resigned older woman (Deirdre Donnelly), finally content in her happy ending.
The linear narrative of Charlotte Brontë’s book is rendered strange in this clever image, as the three different Janes momentarily haunt each other. The unease is easily dispelled, however, by the entrance of Mr Rochester (an orotund Stephen Brennan), who ushers in the unconventional romance at the heart of Brontë’s bleak, but ultimately uplifting, novel.
There are occasional lapses in the present-tense narration that frames director Alan Stanford's stage adaptation, but for the most part Jane Eyreis a fluently episodic stage version of the book. It glances briefly over the central incidents that shape the heroine's early life – the cruelty of her relatives and teachers at Lowgate School, the occasional kindnesses that restore her faith in human nature – before yielding to her middle years, which provide the bulk of the action.
Andrea Corr makes for a fierce and earnest, if perhaps too pretty, embodiment of plain Jane, the governess at Thornfield Hall, as she struggles to control her passion for her evasive master. Thrust out of his arms by misfortune, there is seemingly endless unhappiness for Jane, but the lesson at the heart of this intensely moral tale is that virtue will be rewarded and Jane eventually is.
Despite a problematic vertiginous tilt, Bruno Schwengl’s blue-grey set evokes the cold emotional severity of Jane’s early years and the spartan austerity of Victorian poverty. It also provides enough of a blank slate to enable James McConnell to bring more radiant touches to the atmosphere in the final scene and Deirdre Donnelly utters the infamous final lines – “reader I married him” – with certainty in the audience’s goodwill.
Ultimately, this a faithful, feel-good, family-friendly stage translation, and more than enough to inspire a new generation of readers.
Until 15th January
