--- title: In Hedda’s Take on Ibsen, Style Gets in the Way of Substance description: Though visually inventive, Nia DaCosta's interpretation seems more focused on its own novelty than on the emotional bones of the story. canonical: https://time.com/7327567/hedda-review/ author: Stephanie Zacharek article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2025-10-22T20:32:59.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T04:51:18.027Z article:section: Entertainment og:title: In Hedda’s Take on Ibsen, Style Gets in the Way of Substance og:description: Though visually inventive, Nia DaCosta's interpretation seems more focused on its own novelty than on the emotional bones of the story. og:url: https://time.com/7327567/hedda-review/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt57b995ee2c9485db/6998cae6e1ba00ad8b98e08d/HEDD_2025_FG_00282100_Still277RC_3000.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Hedda og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: In Hedda’s Take on Ibsen, Style Gets in the Way of Substance twitter:description: Though visually inventive, Nia DaCosta's interpretation seems more focused on its own novelty than on the emotional bones of the story. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt57b995ee2c9485db/6998cae6e1ba00ad8b98e08d/HEDD_2025_FG_00282100_Still277RC_3000.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # In _Hedda_’s Take on Ibsen, Style Gets in the Way of Substance > Sponsored content. 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Terms and conditions apply. * Savings buckets are a feature of Ally Bank's Savings Account. * No ATM fees from Ally Bank at Allpoint and Moneypass ATMs plus we reimburse for fees charged by other ATM owners nationwide up to $10 per statement cycle. * Early direct deposit offers eligible direct deposits up to two days sooner. * Spending buckets are a feature of Ally Bank's Spending Account.  by [Stephanie Zacharek](https://time.com/author/stephanie-zacharek/)  ## Stephanie Zacharek Film Critic Oct 22, 2025 8:32 PM UTC  Tessa Thompson in Hedda Tessa Thompson in HeddaCourtesy of Prime  by [Stephanie Zacharek](https://time.com/author/stephanie-zacharek/)  ## Stephanie Zacharek Film Critic Oct 22, 2025 8:32 PM UTC Certain plays, love ’em or hate ’em, are useful in the same way standards make a great playground for singers and jazz musicians. A play that everyone knows—or at least knows something about—can be a framework, a jumping-off point for all kinds of imaginative interpretations. The late-19th century Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen has given us two works in particular that actors and directors love to revisit: both _A Doll’s House_ and _Hedda Gabler_ are stories of unruly women, characters who take decisive action without courting masculine approval. Nora, of _A Doll’s House,_ is a wife and mother who walks out on her family, society be damned. The title character of _Hedda Gabler_ is a bored, unhappily married aristocrat who toys with the fates of those around her as a way of seizing some control over her own life. These are women who have just had it. There’s no sell-by date on their anger, and so they resurface in the culture time and again. There’s a lot of fury in _Hedda,_ Nia DaCosta’s visually inventive, if somewhat disjointed, reimagining of _Hedda Gabler_—though it’s the kind of fury intended to invigorate rather than alienate. Tessa Thompson stars as the willful heroine, married to a rather meek academic, George Tesman (Tom Bateman), who’s angling for an important university position. His chief rival is a woman who has already published one brilliant treatise and just completed another, Eileen Lovborg (played by the terrific German actress Nina Hoss); she also happens to be one of Hedda’s ex-lovers. The setting is Hedda and Tesman’s glorious English country house, sometime in the 1950s. The duo is throwing a party—Eileen will be there, along with her current paramour, also a collaborator in her work, Thea Clifton (Imogen Poots)—though tragedy will strike by the night’s end. Meanwhile, a manipulative judge, Roland Brack (Nicholas Pinnock), lurks around the fringes, hoping to seduce or even blackmail the electrically attractive Hedda. At the beginning of the film, as party preparations are under way, she stands imperiously on the roof of her grand estate in a clingy red jersey dress and shoots at him with a pistol. No wonder he can’t get enough of her.  (L-R): Hedda Gabler (Tessa Thompson), Eileen Lovborg (Nina Hoss), Thea Clifton (Imogen Poots) Parisa Taghizadeh—Prime If you’re not already familiar with the play, you may find yourself a little lost in _Hedda_—or perhaps just bored. DaCosta has made a hit horror film _(Candyman)_ and a mainstream superhero movie _(The Marvels),_ and with _Hedda,_ you get the sense that she and Thompson are having a blast as they break free of the constraints that come with making a studio blockbuster. Thompson’s Hedda and Hoss’ Eileen circle one another like hungry panthers—you can still sense the erotic crackle between them. But elsewhere, you’re not quite sure why Hedda is so intent on stirring the pot. That’s part of the point, of course—Hedda isn’t supposed to be easy to parse. But Thompson’s performance is so mannered that it’s hard to surf Hedda's brainwaves. Her diction is aggressively fluted and mannered, so deliberately stylized that it feels like needless embellishment. Thompson is a terrific actress; she was astonishing Rebecca Hall’s 2021 adaptation of Nella Larson’s _Passing,_ as woman drawn into the fragile web of an old high school friend who has tried to erase her racial identity. But aggressive stylization still needs to serve the essence of the character; it can’t just read as a premeditated, fussed-over choice. It doesn’t help that certain elements of _Hedda_ are deliberately overstated: no actress could survive the garish makeup Hoss wears, or her weird half-siren, half-milkmaid gown, which ends up serving a purpose in the plot—one that feels far too calculated. In interviews, DaCosta has talked about the pleasures of telling stories in which Black women behave badly, instead of being forced to serve as virtuous role models. That’s exactly the kind of director you _want_ for an Ibsen adaptation, someone who can bring a gust of originality to material that’s been mined countless times. But intentions don’t always translate into a cohesive, fully lived-in film. The movie’s production design is gorgeous: it has a luxe, lavish look. Hedda’s grand house, with its flocked wallpaper and ornate mirrors, feels both seductive and oppressive to us—it’s easy to see how it feels to _her._ But _Hedda_ seems more focused on its own novelty than on the emotional bones of the story. The character of Hedda Gabler is elusive by design. The last thing she needs is lots of fancy footwork around her; we need to be allowed to register her ruthlessness and her majesty on our own. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/7327567/hedda-review/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/7327567/hedda-review/"},"headline":"In Hedda’s Take on Ibsen, Style Gets in the Way of Substance","datePublished":"2025-10-22T20:32:59.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:51:18.027Z","description":"Though visually inventive, Nia DaCosta's interpretation seems more focused on its own novelty than on the emotional bones of the story.","url":"https://time.com/7327567/hedda-review/","keywords":["movies","review","culturepod"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt57b995ee2c9485db/6998cae6e1ba00ad8b98e08d/HEDD_2025_FG_00282100_Still277RC_3000.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Stephanie Zacharek","jobTitle":"Film Critic","url":"https://time.com/author/stephanie-zacharek/"}],"articleSection":"Entertainment","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt57b995ee2c9485db/6998cae6e1ba00ad8b98e08d/HEDD_2025_FG_00282100_Still277RC_3000.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Hedda","caption":"Hedda","creditText":"Courtesy of Prime","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/entertainment/","name":"Entertainment"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/movies/","name":"movies"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/7327567/hedda-review/","name":"In Hedda’s Take on Ibsen, Style Gets in the Way of Substance"}}]}] ```