‘I thought “betrayal” was your favourite word’, quips the Vicomte de Valmont in the opening scene of Christopher Hamptons’s adaptation of Pierre Choderlos de Laclos’s Les Liaisons dangereuses (1782). ‘“Cruelty”’, the Marquise de Merteuil retorts. ‘I always think that has a nobler ring to it’. Cruelty and human malice have indeed long underpinned the adaptations and interpretations of Laclos’s canonical novel. Yet, as Hampton explains, in the printed programme as quoted on the National Theatre website, such cruelty appears differently in each generation of the production: when Hampton’s play first saw the stage lights in 1985 with Lesley Manville as Cécile Volanges, he sought to attack the ‘institutionalised selfishness’ of the ‘me generation’. In 2026, with Manville taking the helm as Merteuil and Aidan Turner appearing as her Valmont, Hampton believes that the play resonates with cancel culture, society’s ability to meld and alter the truth, and its ‘boundless greed and appetite for exploitation’.

Between its debut at The Other Place in Stratford in 1985 and its residency with the National Theatre — in the Lyttelton Theatre from March to June 2026 and in cinemas as part of National Theatre Live through to the autumn — Hampton’s interpretation of Laclos’s canonical novel has spawned numerous theatrical productions and film adaptations. This latest production, directed by Marianne Elliot, however, is bolder and harsher than those that came before. Its physicality becomes dizzying and intoxicating, and Valmont and Merteuil’s suffocating cruelty is laid bare for the audiences.

A sticking point, one may imagine, of staging an epistolary novel is what to do with the letters. The letters of Les Liaisons dangereuses are a masterclass in the manipulation of language and Elliot’s production stages letters being written and read through dance. In the staging of the infamous letter XLVII in which Valmont uses Émilie, a sex worker, as a writing desk, Turner and Lucia Chocarro dance across the stage as Turner reads Valmont’s letter to la Présidente de Tourvel out loud. Monica Barbaro as Tourvel, receiving the letter, is soon pulled into their dance. Sex, dance, bodies, and the letter writing process are intertwined. Where the epistolary novel suggests a detachment with the implied distance between the characters, Elliot’s production offers no such respite.

But to think of cruelty in the world of Les Liaisons dangereuses, our minds would turn to the fate of Cécile. Merteuil’s pawn in her plots for revenge, Cécile enters society desperate for knowledge. Such desire is marked by the inclusion of red in her costumes: as the ingénue, she wears a ruby necklace around her neck. When her initiation takes form during the ‘seduction’ scene, she wears a red ribbon tied around her waist. Yet, Cécile suffers in her libertine schooling. The ‘seduction’ scene is claustrophobic, brutal, and more akin to the rape that the novel details than previous productions have dared to allow. The production’s set is bare and minimalist with three mirrored walls that surround the stage and screens that change the settings from salons to bedrooms to corridors to drawing rooms. In this ‘seduction’ scene, the mirrors are noticeably absent, and Cécile is trapped by the screens that surround her bed.

The use of screens and mirrors further call forth a central tension of Les Liaisons dangereuses, that of sight and blindness: the mirrors allow us to see all at the same time that sight is distorted and manipulated; they create confusion rather than permit clarity as multiple bodies swirl across the stage; and the screens hide figures (and knowledge) from view. The mirrors are tellingly covered as Merteuil’s downfall is instigated: when Valmont dies and hands Merteuil’s letters to the Chevalier de Danceny with the instruction to circulate them, a painting of a hunt descends. The painting could indicate that Merteuil has succeeded in her plots: the master huntsman, Merteuil has bested Valmont, destroyed Tourvel, ruined Danceny, and debauched Cécile. She may have achieved her ambitions but at what cost? Separated from the mirrors and from sight, Merteuil hears what Cécile has done to her reputation. Once Merteuil’s downfall has been voiced, the painting lifts and Merteuil is subject to the society that can now see her. Watching them pass her letters between them in another elaborate dance sequence, Merteuil decides to flee: she leaves the literal stage of Les Liaisons dangereuses, running past the front row of the audience to escape the now-open eyes of society.

Laclos’s novel ends with Merteuil’s downfall (and loss an eye to smallpox), Cécile’s return to the convent, Danceny’s exile, and Valmont’s and Tourvel’s deaths. The extent of Merteuil’s and Cécile’s fates have never fully materialised in Hampton’s adaptations: Merteuil gets off scot-free in the 1985 iteration; the 1988 film adaptation shied away from staging Merteuil’s full punishment; and this 2026 production sees Cécile bring about the downfall of the once omnipotent female libertine. For Laclos purists, this ending will always feel a little lacking, as if the viciousness of Laclos’s critique is downplayed in Cécile’s success. Yet, that being said, the casting of Manville (who previously played Cécile) as Merteuil presents a satisfying cyclicality for this new ending: Cécile becomes the new Merteuil.

Elliot seems to be a fan of cyclicality as the play is bookended by dance sequences. The opening dance sees Merteuil approaching Cécile and lifting the ingénue’s mask; Cécile smiles in response. The lifting of the mask — this obstacle to vision — acts as a nod to the knowledge that Cécile will receive because, in the world of Les Liaisons dangereuses, to see is to know. The closing sequence echoes the theme of initiation: Cécile, having put on her own mask, seeks out another young ingénue and lifts this new ingénue’s mask.

Whatever your sensibilities may be towards Hampton’s rewriting of the denouement of Les Liaisons dangereuses, this latest production of the canonical libertine text demonstrates the novel’s endurance. Uncomfortable but compelling, there is no opportunity to escape the cruelty at stake in this play or how we are made complicit in it.