New layers of complexity

Milton Keynes Citizen has a video interview with Jane Eyre resident director Hannah Drake which also shows some behind-the-scenes footage of the production. Lucy Menon posts about one of the Wales Millennium Centre performances.

Henley Standard reviews a stage version of Wuthering Heights recently seen in Windsor.

Everyone involved played out their highly emotional characters to the full, which was discomfiting and powerful.
With the action taking place in the two great houses, the stage was cleverly divided through lighting and styles so that the cast could easily and adeptly switch between the two.
The spooky, stormy atmosphere of the moors was complemented by the blue stone and large windows, lending themselves to the appearance of the odd apparition.
As part of the Windsor Repertory Festival, to turn the stage around so quickly must take some doing, while we were astonished at the ability of the cast to learn and retain so many lines in such a short space of time, which was certainly no mean feat.
Spooky, thought-provoking stuff. (Natalie Aldred)

More from the stage, as The Edinburgh Reporter looks forward to a play that will make its debut during this year's Fringe Festival, A Fayre Tale.

“Brontë for the 21st century?”
As a failing theatre company rehearse the old time classic, Jane Eyre, complex desires within a love triangle emerge reflecting the timelessness of Brontë’s themes.
The Brontë Actors present Priscilla Berringer’s debut play in collaboration with Joanna Faith Habershon (Soft, The Moon Rose, 2016). Directed by Manuel Baù. A three-hander played by Berringer (Sarah), Habershon (Bobby) and Rory McEvoy (Ben).
Merging original text with modern dialogue, a need to be accepted and find meaningful connection with those around us, weaves through our drama. As Sarah offloads frustrations about her loveless marriage onto non-committal Ben, an anxious Bobby tries to prevent her production from falling apart at the seams. (John Preece)

Expressen (Sweden) recalls that the last time the late actor
Michael Nyqvist (on the right) was seen on stage at Dramaten (the Swedish National Theatre) was when he played Mr Rochester in 2009.

The Wall Street Journal reviews The Secret History of Jane Eyre by John Pfordresher:

The story of how Charlotte Brontë, the shy and (in her own words) “plain and small” clergyman’s daughter from Haworth in Yorkshire, came to write a proto-feminist romance that became one of the 19th century’s best sellers, is as gripping as any in her novels. When “Jane Eyre” appeared in 1847, nothing quite like it had been published in English before. (Elizabeth Lowry)

Writer Rowan Coleman shares '10 Things I'd Like My Readers To Know About Me' on Female First. One of which is

I'm a huge Brontë fan - give me anything Brontë to read and I'm happy. I'm saving up for a first edition. It will take ages. 

Moira Macdonald is also a Brontë enthusiast as so her column on how 'Some books are too good to read just once (or twice)' in The Seattle Times was sure to include a Brontë reference:

But it isn’t just kids’ books that I like to reread, delightful as that can be. Certain classics can reverberate at different times in life, rewarding a frequent revisit. The poignancy of “The Great Gatsby” never fails to pull me in, even now as I note how very young the characters are. “Jane Eyre” brings some new layer of complexity every time I read it. 

Production HUB finds a different kind of similarity between the latest screen adaptation of Anne of Green Gables and the Brontës:

[Cinematographer Bobby Shore] used a few visual references in developing the look of the series, including Andrea Arnold’s Wuthering Heights, Jane Campion’s The Piano and Bright Star, and Cary Fukunaga’s Jane Eyre. (Neil Matsumoto)

Broadsheet (Australia) recommends the film Lady Macbeth, describing it as

very British gothic, all frosty and morally repugnant, drawing on everything from Jane Eyre to Lady Chatterley’s Lover. (Will Cox)

The Adelaide Review also mentions the similarities:

A pre-feminist tale taken to uneasy extremes, Oldroyd’s chilly epic might at first feel like a gloomy costume piece the likes of a Wuthering Heights or Jane Eyre, but the characters here are far less noble, the path of true love is certainly more tormented, and Pugh’s formidable Katherine proves hardly a swooning damsel-in-distress-type as she rises against her humiliation and abuse. But, after all, what is a girl to do? (DM Bradley)

Bookish Whimsy reviews Sarah Shoemaker's Mr Rochester. Uai (Brazil) reviews the film Mal de pierres and mentions its Wuthering Heights references. Yesterday was the wedding anniversary of Charlotte Brontë and Arthur Bell Nicholls and Nick Holland discusses their marriage on AnneBrontë.org.