Anna Karenina review: ‘fluid and febrile’ adaptation of Tolstoy’s classic novel

Lindsey Campbell gives a ‘terrific’ performance in the title role

Anna Karenina at Royal Lyceum Theatre in Edinburgh
A production that ‘fairly blazes with a theatrical energy’
(Image credit: Robbie McFadzean)

This entertaining co-production of “Anna Karenina”, which transfers from Edinburgh’s Royal Lyceum Theatre to Bristol Old Vic next month, “began as a dare”, said Fergus Morgan in The Stage. The British-Russian director Polina Kalinina was complaining to the Scottish writer Lesley Hart that Russian literary texts typically “suffered from staidness and staleness in translation”. In response, Hart challenged Kalinina to collaborate with her on a stage adaptation, to put this situation right.

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