FringeReview UK 2026
Les Liaisons Dangereuses
National Theatre, London
Genre: Adaptation, classical, Drama, Feminist Theatre, Mainstream Theatre, Theatre, Tragedy
Venue: National Theatre, Lyttelton
Festival: FringeReview UK
Low Down
Perhaps in the years since Christopher Hampton’s 1985 Les Liaisons-Dangereuses was first staged, Laclos’ 1782 novel has become dangerous again. Or more relevant, perhaps the same thing here. There’s a vulpine ferocity to this revival of National Theatre Lyttelton directed by Marianne Elliott till June 6.
A magnificent production – satisfying in so many ways.
Review
“It’s too easy… I have my reputation to think of.” Aidan Turner’s Valmont dares to demur at an “order” of his former lover Lesley Manville’s Merteuil. Perhaps in the years since Christopher Hampton’s 1985 Les Liaisons-Dangereuses was first staged, Laclos’ 1782 novel has become dangerous again. Or more relevant, perhaps the same thing here. There’s a vulpine ferocity to this revival of National Theatre Lyttelton directed by Marianne Elliott till June 6. Tom Jackson Greaves’ choreography sweeps up a larger number of cast members – twenty, as opposed to the original nine – into savage ballroom that engulfs everyone. It’s a bit like Ravel’s La Valse, portraying the Armageddon of World War One: the 1789 revolution wasn’t far off.
Though since 1980 things have reverted, as we’re reminded in a programme essay. Indeed in Rosanna Vise’s wilderness of mirrors with interlocking cubicles whirled on and off, even the audience might glimpse themselves. The Lyttelton’s space seems doubled, with a whisk of digital artist Daniel Radley-Bennett’s grey-scaled naked leg artwork above. Natalie Roar’s gorgeous costumes signal the late eighteenth century in women: from courtesan Emilie’s Tyrian, Merteuil’s vampish red to most air-blue for Tourvel. The men though are Byronically clad in timeless Dracula black with white shirts. The recorded Tippett Quartet too play Jasmine Kent Rodgman’s slithery score: eerie, nocturnal and noirish.
The feel of Elliott’s revival is slightly recessed in the swept stage, yet more playful. Manville famously not only played the “too easy” Cécile in that original 1985 production, she’s gone on to play Merteuil recently in a 2022 TV series. Here she seems like the popular vision of a Machiavel, and though she takes lovers, it’s almost for a chess-move removed from whatever pleasure she once enjoyed with Valmont. Manville’s voice is all measure and pounce, a hint of languor deceptively charming more minion lovers than Valmont, or her next prey.
Turner’s Valmont is warmly roguishly-voiced, yet far more believable as the man who falls in love with his own prey – Tourvel (an agitated, socially petrified, then passionate and agonised Monica Barbaro). Turner’s strength also lies in the heedlessness with which he helps out an injured tenant of his aunt’s to get a good report to Tourvel and then forget his name, yet covering himself. It’s Turners nonchalance that transmits the full blank stare of the ancient regime more than calculation, or the alter insistence with Merteuil that seems almost a faux pas. And in his savage exchanges with Barbaro that here become vicious and desperate, without the control he’d promised Merteuil,
Tourvel’s not part of Merteuil’s plans: but the 16-year-old Cécile is, since her intended older bridegroom cast off Merteuil and she wants vengeance. Her weakness in her overreach is that her vengeance never ends.
Hannah van der Westhuysen, her Cécile demure but with a hint of sensuality to flip and far more, has a first misfortune: Volanges (a watchful yet gullible plotter in Cat Simmons’ vision of arranged marriages) is her mother. Not only controlling, she’s interfered and warned off Tourvel against Valmont. So he’s now in the revenge game and van der Westhuysen realises not simply as a young woman soon delighted in her “instruction’ but someone here cornered into granting Valmont access.
Hampton veers from some of the original’s cruelty, and in his finale brings in a theatrical La Ronde feel, as if the next generation has learned the same lessons, but more cannily. In this production what might have been calculation adheres to Hampton in Valmont’s blatant- and heedless – dancing with mistress Emelie (Lucia Chocarro, seen always dancing), at a point when three of his lovers almost collide in the same room.
Danceny, the lover kept from Cécile for too long is appropriately puppyish in Darragh Hand’s open-hearted Chevalier: both he and and jis intended instructed by dark champions. Again it’s Hampton’s realisation that even in combat (here prolonged and not a mere scuffle in Sam Lyon-Behan’s ballet-cum-bullring-like fight direction), there’s male solidarity in this class,
Gabriele Drake as Valmont’s aunt de Rosemonde shows herself in fact a balance of worldliness, poised between understanding all and forgiving quite a lot: with Drake it’s a role that gathers some authority here. Whereas Merteuil’s butler Major-Domo (Ali Goldsmith) and even more Valmont’s Azolan (a chipper Sharif Afifi) are granted small degrees of life, there’s flickers of roles in Rosemonde’s servant Adlee (Amy Macken) and Tourvel’s gullible priest Anselme (Curts Angus) with servant Julie (Nandi Bhebhe). They swell the ranks of dancers Cum servants) Ishmael Aaron, Charlotte Avery, Liz Ewing, Georges Hann, Dianté Lodge, Aisha Naamani, Bryony Pennington.
Elliott has certainly imprinted here more a society, less a circle where the whirligig of time brings in revenges even Merteuil can’t control. Yet despite the key phrase, in part “Never show pity” Hampton has; and Elliott’s glittering panache has here recessed even that cruelty just a touch. It’s as if what 40 years ago seemed less controversial – coercive control and rape, for instance – is presented to us to judge without the need to see the world chilled further. Manville’s Merteuil seems inscrutable in some of her vengeance, and this Valmont almost capable of redemption. It’s unsettling. Though this is a classic adaptation unlikely to be surpassed, Hampton rather than Laclos has left one or two threads in his brilliant traversal. And this magnificent production – satisfying in so many ways – has let us see that.
Sound Design Ian Dickinson for Autograph, Intimacy Director Ingrid Mackminnon, Fight Director Sam Lyon-Behan, Casting Directors Alastair Coomer CDG, Naomi Downham CDG, Voice and Dialect Coach Hazel Holder, Associate Wigs Hair & Make-Up Designer Adele Brandman. Associate Choreographer Katie Lusby, Assistant Voice Coach Zoe Littleton.
Producer Harriet Mackie, Production Manager Heather Doole, CSM David Marsland, DSM Surenee Somchit, ASMs Zoe Gledhill and Lucy Napier, DSM Cover Aimee Woods, ASM Cover Alice Lavelle, Deputy Production Manager Lisa Hood and Andrew Pellett, Project Draughting Janet Williamson and Emma Morris, Digital Art Daniel Radley-Bennett, Costume Supervisor Male Arcucci, Assistant Costume Supervisor Mariama Bojang. Wigs Hair & Make-Up Supervisor Adele Brandman.
