Vanity Fair

Thackeray may have written Vanity Fair as a sprawling serialised novel, but at its heart is the self-conscious theatre of life in the early 19th century. What better novel to take to the stage?

The story follows two very different young women who have completed their education together into marriage, motherhood and developing social ambition.

The characters remain almost perpetually on stage, enabling a fast-paced and very funny jaunt through a complex story. A multiple-voiced narrator speaks through the characters themselves, revealing their inner thoughts as well as background. Despite regularly freezing the action on stage, the effect is to keep the story alive.

The play is full of surprises, from a musical number to witty use of very simple props - taking two table legs, for instance, and using them to serve seamlessly as billiard cues as well as a crucifix.

Vanity Fair is subtitled ‘A Novel Without a Hero’ and, indeed, none of the characters are likeable, from the conniving Becky Sharp (Sophia Linden) to saccharine moraliser Amelia Sedley (Kim Gerard). Nevertheless, as a whole, it is compelling. Their torments and joys are admirably well-portrayed, while subsidiary characters are utterly convincing in multiple roles. They take themselves so seriously that Cownie’s humorous and clever onstage jigsaw of events and props never seems over-contrived.

One of the great strengths of this production is the stripped-back set, which allows the story itself to shine. If it were more lavish, it would only serve to legitimise the shallow aspirations of the characters. Costumes are simple, too, and stained as though to symbolise the taint of the vanity of those wearing them.

The production edges on the farcical, yet never oversteps the line and therefore succeeds in taking a dense text and making it accessible and, essentially, highly enjoyable.