Enchanting, heart-warming, and certainly the perfect period drama, Anne-Marie Casey’s adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women, was brought to the stage on 1-5 April at Festival Theatre. The story of the four March sisters shone in the hands of the creatives involved, allowing a mesmerising night at the theatre.
As expected of Jo March, Grace Molony was the absolute beating heart of the story: vivacious, boisterous, ardent and utterly enthralling. The audience trusted Molony and followed her religiously as she navigated the twists and turns of Jo’s thoughts and feelings. Honeysuckle Weeks was cast as the loving yet proud and protective Marmee, becoming a moral and emotional pendulum through which the March girls found their stability and temperance to grow as women. Jade Kennedy’s performance of Meg was also particularly notable: often portrayed as fairly tepid, Kennedy’s Meg was charismatic, joyful, and a vibrant pillar of March sister life.
Casey’s adaptation, bolstered by Mike Ashcroft’s movement direction, was certainly motivated by particular opinions pertaining to the Laurie-Jo-Amy love triangle. Jo and Laurie’s childish play at early moments was a sort of physical, light bickering, which became increasingly open to interpretation the older they became, often entangled in one another. Furthermore, Casey included an early kiss between Jo and Laurie, which naturally caused outraged gasps throughout the audience.
The arrival of Laurie (Cillian Lenaghan) and Amy (Imogen Elliot) as a married couple was a purposefully painful watch: stilted and awkward, their need to demonstrate and exaggerate the new romantic nature of their relationship clashed with the March household, striking unease in the audience. Despite this, Elliot’s Amy was a defiant, charming interpretation of the character.
Although whole-heartedly rooting for Jo and Bhaer, Casey’s interpretation communicated that Jo and Laurie would always be an unfinished story: Laurie seemed to purposely mislead Bhaer at one stage, almost ruining Jo’s future relationship. Casey’s pointed adaptation therefore fueled the endless debate on the topic, and was perfectly carried out by Lenaghan, ever ambiguous in true feelings, post-marriage.
Set design by Ruari Murchison incorporated nature into the everyday March life, featuring a sitting room enveloped in forestry. This allowed seamless transitions between scenes, whilst other set modifications at later points (for example, the addition of bookcases whilst Jo is in New York) were equally ingenious and subtly executed.
One thing the audience is left to question is the idea of “Little Women” and older men: whilst one must accept the constraints of Alcott’s contemporary society (wherein it was a societal norm for younger women to be paired with older men), should modern audiences accept this? Jack Ashton’s multi-role performances as Bhaer and Brooke were engaging and impressively distinct; he successfully became a malleable piece, pairing well with both Jo and Meg. By no means a criticism of his proficiency, one questions this decision of multi-rolling and whether the production should continue with narratives of his characters (particularly Brooke) being considerably older than the March sisters. One can argue that modern theatre, and its adaptations of older works, could be the golden opportunity to rectify these narrative hiccups.
Overall, Little Women was an enticing, delectable night at the theatre: Casey’s adaptation, with Loveday Ingram’s direction at the helm, pieced together a brilliant stage production of Alcott’s classic novel.
Image by Nobby Clark, courtesy of Capital Theatres