Hedda Gabler, Royal and Derngate Theatre, Northampton, review Hedda Gabler is one of the greatest plays ever written, yet on stage it has a tendency to come across as an amateur dramatic performance. Within its realism is a stark, expressionist quality - difficult to pull off within the confines of Dr Tesman's Oslo drawing-room - while the character of Hedda all too easily becomes a mere theatrical idea, bearing no relation to any woman who has ever lived. Ibsen is all the rage right now - the new Rattigan, one might say - what with the current London productions of A Doll's House and St John's Night, and the forthcoming Hedda Gabler at the Old Vic this autumn. Promising though that Hedda sounds, however, it has been set an undeniably high bar by the Royal and Derngate's artistic director, Laurie Sansom. For Sansom has done something far harder than he makes it look: he has blown the dust from Ibsen's masterpiece and brought it to completely believable life. Andrew Upton's adaptation - first performed with his wife, Cate Blanchett, in the lead - is a tremendous help. Upton firmly grasps the lurking melodrama, keeping the famous line in which Hedda pictures her fantasy love, Ejlert Lovborg, with "vine leaves in his hair," but he has a droll, demotic voice that brings us up squarely against reality. There is a small moment when Judge Brack (brilliant Jay Villiers) says to a departing Tesman: "Are you all right for transport?," and somehow that throwaway line gives us precisely the dependence that the Tesmans have upon Brack, and Brack's assured acceptance of it. This production reveals the play to be an intricate ensemble piece. In an excellent cast, Jack Hawkins does wonders with the weak yet tenacious Tesman. Nevertheless Hedda Gabler stands or falls by its lead, and Emma Hamilton, young and lovely as a Renoir, is hardly in the usual "strong actress" mould. Yet she commands the part from her entrance, moving with a loose nonchalance that bespeaks both aristocratic confidence and appalling restlessness. Her graceful femininity shines a piercing light upon Hedda's dilemma: she looks so well-equipped for the female role, but she does not know how to play it. All she can do is move inexorably towards her exit route. So "real" is the production that there is perhaps a slight loss of tragic grandeur, but its grip and clarity goes a long way as compensation. Intriguing, intelligent and highly recommended.