In our age of digital manipulation and virtual deceit, there’s something palate-cleansing about watching 18th-century French aristocrats weaponize real-world physical intimacy for sport. Welcome to Wren Theatre’s compelling, sexually charged new production of Dangerous Liaisons, in which Director Tatum Lee transforms the Annex Theatre’s spacious thrust stage into a deadly playground. Her nobles dance through dangerous games with practiced precision, bringing fresh relevance to Christopher Hampton’s 1985 adaptation of Pierre Choderlos de Laclos scandalous 1782 novel Les Liaisons dangereuses.
For the uninitiated, Dangerous Liaisons follows two aristocratic lovers who turn seduction and manipulation into an art form. The Marquise de Merteuil and the Vicomte de Valmont orchestrate elaborate schemes of corruption and conquest, using sex as their weapon of choice. The Vicomte’s target is the virtuous Madame de Tourvel, while Merteuil’s target — only reachable if she can bend the reluctant Vicomte to the task — is the innocent Cécile de Volanges, who is the intended bride of Merteuil’s ex-lover. What begins as a multi-level game of calculated pressure and pleasure descends into a devastating study of pride, revenge, and moral bankruptcy.
Lee’s minimalist staging proves that — even in the opulence of French high society just before the Revolution — less is indeed more. While the characters boast the sumptuous yet restrictive staples of period costume, such as hoop skirts, plunging bodices and brocade-festooned doublets, Serhat Doganteken’s set consists of little more than a versatile gilt chaise longue and accompanying chair. These two pieces are used to conjure locations ranging from Merteuil’s opulent salon, to the country drawing room of Vicomte’s aunt, to an intimate bedchamber where virtue meets its demise. The sparse design is elevated by a few strategically placed candles and four suggestively off-kilter neoclassical paintings which are visible on the walls – their (I think) AI-generated hyper-realism reflecting back the artificial nature of this world — and ours.
The streamlined design works because Lee makes the architecture of the Annex Theatre itself an active participant in the show’s dance of deception. Beneath the theatre’s high ceiling, characters rush in and out of multiple entry points – at stage left and right, through the center right or center left of the audience, and through exits at the top of the twin staircases that ascend from the stage. We feel enmeshed in a vast estate where secrets lurk around every corner. The majestic staircases are used to especially imaginative effect, hosting furtive encounters, near-misses, and (a-hem) multi-layered exchanges, which by turns surprise, amuse and titillate.
Jesse McQueen’s Marquise de Merteuil commands the elastic Annex stage with lethal charm. From her first appearance – a wickedly funny tableau of her morning toilette in the upper window atop the staircases – she electrifies the space with her serpentine grace and withering commentary. She skillfully peels back Merteuil’s layers, unfolding the weaponized pain and calculated malice beneath the witty exterior. Her devastating monologue about surmounting a woman’s place in society and inventing herself as a “virtuoso of deceit” lands with particular force under Lee’s decision to isolate her in spotlight — the darkness around her suggesting both the void of her moral universe and the ahistorical universality of her situation.
As Valmont, Devin Bell brings a delicious hypnotic languor to his predatory pursuits. His performance is a masterclass in controlled energy: each drawled syllable and leisurely movement masks — or rather encodes — the contradiction of his character’s relentless drive and the crushing boredom he seeks to combat. The chemistry between Bell and McQueen crackles with such electricity that it’s easy to lose ourselves in their dance.
As the objects of their games, Lizette Mynhardt captures Madame de Tourvel’s inner struggle with heart-wrenching authenticity, while Katelyn Doyle’s Cécile transforms convincingly from giggling ingénue to corrupted innocent. Meanwhile, Lucas Blakely provides well-calibrated comic relief as the young Chevalier Danceny, whose awkward, over-the-top puppyhood evolves into something decidedly more dangerous under Merteuil’s tutelage. And Shannon Pitre’s Madame de Volanges ably straddles the line between an object of mockery and the source of a maternal concern that provides a moral counterweight to the tawdry proceedings. The strong cast is filled out by Amanda D’Souza’s Julie, Anne Shepherd’s sturdy Madame de Rosemonde and Trevor Ketcheson’s grasping Azolan.
Intimacy Director Lizzie Moffatt deserves special recognition for choreographing the production’s titular liaisons with a varied and sizzling sensuality – and for being front and center in some of the steamiest, in the role of courtesan Émilie. These encounters range from comedic fumbling to passionate surrender, advancing the story and quickening the pulse, while exploring the period’s complex power dynamics.
ic and work in synch with the stripped-down setting, the production leans pointedly into theatrical artifice in certain choices. I’ve already mentioned the use of spotlighting that takes us out of the setting at key moments, including right at the show’s end. A second example is the use of English accents by most of the cast, despite the show’s French setting. This is both an expedient shorthand for conjuring the distant time, place and class of these characters and a glaring, even manipulative contrivance.
As we watch these privileged few play their dangerous games, oblivious to the impending French Revolution (which is literally at hand as the play closes), it’s impossible not to think of our current moment in history. In 2025 – as wealth inequality soars, social media and AI enable new forms of manipulation, and the powerful turn personal, familial and even international relationships into transactions to be monetized – Wren Theatre’s immersive Dangerous Liaisons asks necessary and timely questions about power, privilege, and the cost of conflating connection with conquest.
Wren Theatre’s Dangerous Liaisons runs through June 7 at the Annex Theatre. Book tickets on wrentheatre.com.
© Scott Sneddon, Sesaya Arts Magazine 2025
