Taking his seat to watch the opening night of Jane Eyre at Stamford Arts Centre, the chap next to me glanced at the stage and commented to his companion: “I didn’t know it was set on a building site.”

While I’ve no doubt he was being waggish, he had a point.

The stage for this classic gothic romance was decorated with nothing more than scaffolding forming a platform at the back, and an attic room to the side - this requiring plenty of imagination, since mad Mrs Rochester could have strolled through any of the four open sides.

Another slight bugbear, before we begin, was the treatment of the audience regarding the issue of ‘madness’. While in real life I’m all for a modern approach to mental health issues, I’m willing to give Charlotte Brontë a break, not least since she was writing fiction, and in the 1840s.

You’d have to be a particularly uptight and unworldly sort to tut at her characterisation of Mr and Mrs Rochester, and yet there’s pretty much a full-page apology for it in the programme.

Fortunately, Stamford Shoestring Theatre can be relied upon for solid acting, and Chloe Taylor gave the title character a powerful mixture of reserve and passion, prim principles and a desire to tear down social constraints.

Ellie Corrigan, who proved her comedy timing in last year’s production of The 39 Steps, played four parts rather brilliantly, having great fun with lively, insouciant Adele, Mr Rochester’s French ward - although I’m surprised there wasn’t any hand-wringing in the programme about Gallic stereotypes.

Hats off too, to Stephanie Thompson-Collins, on stage throughout the two-hour production as Mrs Rochester, writhing and gurning in her scaffold attic while the plot unfolds front and centre.

She could have looked hammy and conspicuous, but instead keeps this strange element of the production simmering in the background - so strange it also requires a page in the programme explaining what the blazes it means.

The cast of nine play more than 20 roles between them, without noticeable mishaps or missing lines. Impressively - and this applies to Corrigan and Michael Hughes in particular - several switch from playing children to adults, and paupers to posh folk, changing outfits, accents and demeanours seamlessly over the course of the play.

Mr Rochester’s dog is perhaps a human role too far on stage, and although Hughes makes it comic and well-observed, the playwright Polly Teale, who created the stage adaptation in 1998, should have found an attic for the hound and thrown away the key.

Shoestring’s Jane Eyre is full of fine acting and tells Brontë’s story well enough, but the scaffolding and the avant-garde ‘embodiments of inner feelings’ is theatre trying too hard to be ‘theatrical’ and forgetting what entertains us ordinary sorts. (Suzanne Moon)

“Wuthering Heights” is not a love story. All-consuming love leads Catherine and Heathcliff to be selfish and cruel to those around them. The film was unfiltered, twisted, dimensional, passionate and beautiful. Through the fog and through the hills, travel to your local AMC or Regal movie theater to see “Wuthering Heights” today. (Talia Scarpa)

Will Wuthering Heights ever be made true to the literary version – of which I have actually read – and at the same time be worthy of the largest screen with the best sound and indeed soundtrack? One may never know. Is this perfect? No. Is this the best adaptation? For me, yes. Despite the hate online, Wuthering Heights remains a gorgeous hit grossing at the time of publication, approaching $160million and counting. (Piers)

   

 A new touring production of Jane Eyre by the Sussex-based company This is My Theatre:

Jane Eyre

Touring March 6-May 4th

Written by Charlotte Brontë

Directed by Sarah Slator

Adapted by Ethan Taylor

Music by Simon Stallard

With: Niall McDaid- St John Rivers // Mr Brocklehurst

Jack Prince - Rochester

Isobel Rathband- Jane Eyre

Lily Smith - Mrs Fairfax // Helen

Orphaned and alone, Jane Eyre grows up in a world that seeks to silence her spirit. Defiant in her search for freedom, belonging, and love, she finds herself at Thornfield Hall - where the enigmatic Mr. Rochester hides dark secrets behind its walls.

Passion, mystery, and resilience collide in this sweeping story of self-discovery and courage, brought to life in a bold new adaptation - with traditional folk music woven throughout - of Charlotte Brontë’s timeless classic!

   

How did the Brontë Parsonage Museum get involved with the release of the new Wuthering Heights film?

Our museum director, Rebecca Yorke, first met with representatives of Warner Bros and Emerald Fennell’s team over a year ago, in early February 2025. 

We then invited Emerald to be a speaker at our Brontë Women’s Writing Festival in September and have a private tour of the museum. As the event was the first time she’d spoken publicly about the film, it was very exciting for us to hear about her creative process.

Initially, our involvement was through our social media channels. Warner Bros had asked if we’d be happy to share digital assets like trailers and posters on our socials in the lead up to the film’s release. We knew we wanted to be a part of the conversation, especially as anticipation was building.

One of our most successful posts was in collaboration with the Wuthering Heights movie Instagram page: we put together a post to celebrate the anniversary of the novel’s publication, which hit 703k views and we gained hundreds of new followers as a result.

What has the museum been up to as part of its engagement with the film? 

The museum has been able to engage with audiences in new and unique ways because of the adaptation. We were invited down to London for the press junket and premiere, and I personally had the exciting opportunity to interview Emerald Fennell and Margot Robbie, the lead actor playing Catherine Earnshaw.

It was fantastic to get bespoke content for the museum that was specifically tailored to our audiences. I wanted to bring the conversation back to Emily Brontë’s novel and our collections, and it really came through how much they both appreciate Brontë’s writing and the work we do as a museum.

The UK premiere in Leicester Square was a surreal experience, and never a place you’d expect to be when you sign up to work in a museum!

The museum had the rare chance to highlight one of our collection items on the red carpet. We worked with stylist Andrew Mukamal and designer Dilara Findikoglu to assist them in the creation of a look inspired by a hair bracelet that belonged to Charlotte Brontë.

Victorian hairwork features at different points throughout the film and the museum has multiple pieces of hair jewellery in its collection.

We were happy to introduce Andrew to Wyedean Weaving, a local manufacturer, to create a replica bracelet, and also facilitated visits to the museum by Dilara’s team so they could colour-match the hair for the dress to the original bracelet.

This fashion moment meant that millions of people have now seen an item in our collection that may not otherwise have done so. From a conservation perspective, it also provided us with the opportunity to do further research into the original bracelet and have it assessed and cleaned by a jewellery conservator.

How has the release of the film impacted the current resonance of the Brontë family and their work?

The main impact, which I think should be celebrated most, is that so many people are picking up Wuthering Heights for the first time. Sales of the book have increased by almost 500% in comparison to the previous year, and the museum sold 388 copies over February half-term alone. That’s remarkable for a novel that’s almost 180 years old, but as Margot Robbie said in our interview, “what an incredible thing to achieve something so enduring”.

There has been so much conversation around the novel, which has led to increasing intrigue from people who want to know what all the fuss is about. Classic literature isn’t always the most accessible and it shouldn’t be taken for granted that a new wave of readers are diving into Wuthering Heights.

In addition, the Brontë Parsonage Museum is the place where Emily Brontë lived and wrote her famous novel, and we’ve already seen an increase in visitor numbers. If the film acts as a gateway to discovering the Brontës, then that’s fantastic and we look forward to welcoming those new audiences who want to learn more.

Has the experience influenced the museum's future plans around exhibitions, public engagement and beyond?

We’ve been holding “Wuthering Heights readiness meetings” since the late autumn! With the buzz already surrounding the film online, we planned related exhibitions, events and new merchandise.

Our programme officer curated a photographic installation that presents a century of Wuthering Heights screen adaptations from across the globe, highlighting the various ways this story has been told on screen. There are also many events in our programme focused on Wuthering Heights, along with talks and workshops about hairwork and lace-making to tie in with the themes of the film.

We’ve also considered how we can link to the film through our museum displays in ways that new audiences will recognise. Our curators have put together a case of hairwork and mourning jewellery, including the bracelet that inspired Margot Robbie’s UK premiere look.

For fans of the film, the museum has also kindly been loaned a prop by LuckyChap Entertainment. A Book of Friendship is a scrapbook shown in the film that Isabella makes for Catherine as a Christmas present. It’s currently on display in the Exhibition Room.

Leading on the museum’s social media activity in the build-up to the film’s release, I wanted our content to link back to Emily Brontë’s life and work.

I made a video for TikTok and Instagram highlighting various objects in the museum’s collection that belonged to Emily Brontë, set to Charli XCX’s Chains of Love. This is our most viewed piece of content ever, currently sitting at over 830k views – likely because it appeals to both existing and new audiences.

Do you have any top tips for other museums looking to make the most of relevant cultural moments?

I would say that film adaptations do have a place in writer’s house museums. Screen tourism is a huge driving force for domestic and international visits to the UK, and the role heritage plays in that shouldn’t be underestimated.

The Brontë Parsonage Museum will always continue to attract literary tourists as the Brontës’ novels are significant to English literature, but we cannot rely solely on literary tourism as a motive for visits. We also live in a time where social media influences many of our choices: what books we read, what films we watch and where we visit.

It’s not about whether an adaptation is faithful to the book, it’s about taking this moment to showcase who we are and what we do to people who are discovering us for the first time.

While our engagement with the film has prompted criticism from some quarters, we believe that our content aligns with our brand values of excellence and creativity, fulfilling our mission to “bring the Brontës to the world, and the world to Yorkshire”. (Francesca Collins)

Emerald Fennell’s “Wuthering Heights” plays like erotic Brontë fan fiction, with a latex dress for Cathy and some finger-sucking for Heathcliff. (Amanda Hess)

Before I enthusiastically leap onto the internet’s already overcrowded hate-wagon for this movie, let me give credit where it is due: the film is undeniably entertaining, visually luxurious, and powered by an addictive soundtrack. That being said, there are certainly a few rather large elephants roaming Fennell’s moors that need addressing. It appears Fennell has constructed a strangely contradictory version of Georgian England. One where racism has conveniently disappeared, and shameless debauchery and public displays of pleasure are normalised. Considering racial discrimination and oppression of women sit at the very heart of Brontë’s novel, it is a striking choice for Fennell to sidestep those tensions by depicting a world saturated with exaggerated perversity; as though oppression is too uncomfortable to depict, but eroticism is fair game. [...]

Fennell’s serial aestheticisation persists through Isabella, whose suffering is reframed through a BDSM-inflected lens. To be clear, there is nothing inherently wrong with depicting consensual kink in cinema. But Brontë’s Isabella is a domestic abuse victim, tortured by Heathcliff. Turning her trauma into stylised eroticism feels backward, even exploitative. In the film, her sadomasochism functions less as character development and more as an ornamental attempt to bring edginess to our white romanticised Heathcliff. Stripped of its narrative weight, Isabella’s degradation becomes spectacle. An invitation for the audience to voyeuristically delve into a kinky and forbidden world rather than reckon with the canonical brutality of her experience.

Ultimately, these choices are emblematic of a larger pattern. This adaptation reveals more about what it assumes of its audience than about the story itself. It presumes we crave flattened complexity as long as it comes wrapped in lush cinematography and salacious allusions. And, for once, Fennell is not wrong in this assumption. For centuries, society has romanticised the violent, brooding Wuthering Heights into a tale of tragic star-crossed lovers. So, is this Wuthering Heights a betrayal of Brontë? Perhaps. But it acts more as a reflection of our cultural appetites. As we may question why this version came to be? Afterall, adaptations like this do not materialise in a vacuum. They are facilitated by cultural trends and audience desires. Considering the cultural frenzy sparked by the provocative surplus in Saltburn (2023), it is hardly shocking that Fennell has catered this beloved classic to a modern audience, who are seemingly more interested in the scandalous spectacle Hollywood’s white heartthrob Jacob Elordi might offer us, than in any racial brutality that is at the heart of the original story. 

If this Wuthering Heights’ adaptation feels like a product of our obsession with aestheticised toxicity and hyper-sexuality, with constantly craving “the stiffy,” that is because we demanded it to be. And perhaps that is the most uncomfortable truth about this adaptation. (Freya McLaughlin)

   

The Northern Ballet's Wuthering Heights ballet is returning to Leeds:

Claude-Michel Schönberg's

Wuthering Heights

A Ballet by David Nixon OBE

5 Mar 2027 - 13 Mar 2027 14:30 & 19:30

Leeds Grand Theatre

On the wild Yorkshire moors, love isn't tender. It's ravenous. 

Passionate and obsessive, Cathy and Heathcliff's love is a force of nature — beautiful, brutal and impossible to escape. Told through breathtaking dance and heart-wrenching storytelling, this dramatic tale will sweep you into a haunting world of romance and revenge.

Choreographed by David Nixon CBE and set to original music by celebrated composer Claude-Michel Schönberg (West End and Broadway's Les Misérables and Miss Saigon), Emily Brontë’s gothic masterpiece tears itself from the pages and onto the stage in Northern Ballet's adaptation of Wuthering Heights.