Hedda

Hedda is torn between the lingering ache of a past love and the quiet suffocation of her present life. Over the course of one charged night, long-repressed desires and hidden tensions erupt—pulling her and everyone around her into a spiral of manipulation, passion, and betrayal. Deep down what Hedda really desires is love, but on this night, she chooses power and control over love. A modern reimagining of the Ibsen play, set in 1950s England.

COMMENTARY
This is a heart-pounding, transgressive, and openly feminist new film version of Hedda Gabler, Henrik Ibsen’s 1890 play, a classic constantly performed ever since, and by some of the world’s greatest actresses.

DIRECTOR'S STATEMENT
Ibsen is like Shakespeare or Jane Austen: it is classic drama that can be made over in our own image. I decided that Ejlert would become Eileen. Making Lövborg a woman meant I now had three women and three different ways to be—or try to be—free. Hedda colors within the lines of society to get her way. Eileen chooses her mind. And Thea chooses love, chooses truth. People do love extreme characters, maybe because they do the things you wish you could do but never would. Or maybe they do the things that you would never do, but watching them do it cracks something open in you. “What is she thinking? What would I do in her place? How do you love? How do you achieve? And can you truly do both?”