Theatre Review: Vardy v Rooney: The Wagatha Christie Trial
It was a game of two halves with many chances for both sides to score a winner – but in the end it was an own goal that decided the court case. The Wagatha Christie affair has gone down in modern media and cultural history as one of the most ridiculous legal battles of modern times. Both Coleen Rooney and Rebekah Vardy showed themselves up – to use the modern parlance as – airheads. Or more prosaically a couple of rich spoilt women with egos the size of Wembley Stadium with nothing better to do than bitch about each other in public.
Olivia Hennessy’s play Vardy v Rooney: The Wagatha Christie Trial was staged by Axbridge Community Theatre in the town hall this week in front of full houses. It essentially sends up the shallow lives of the WAGS (Wives and Girlfriends of Footballers) and casts a spotlight on how the media – particularly the so-called Tabloids – lapped it up to feed to their readers as gossip repackaged as news. Based on the libel case trial in 2022 in which Mrs Vardy sued Mrs Rooney for defamation when Mrs Rooney named Mrs Vardy in an online post as the person selling private stories about the Rooney’s to The Sun newspaper. Hennessy’s script used the actual words spoken in court but also used two fictional pundits to give the context, using footballing jargon in a hilarious running commentary.
Set on a mixture of a football pitch and a court room the play follows the course of the court case along with numerous flashbacks to fill in the background. The set itself was the star of the show – so all credit to Dave Moore and John Dunstone along with the help of Steve Higgins, Paul Pritchard, Taddy Horacek, Katie Berry and Liam Cox.
Protagonist Liz Browne as Rebekah Vardy was at turns surly, sulky and fiery giving a committed performance of a woman under fire by the relentless questioning of David Sherborne with her defence of ‘I don’t remember’, ‘that’s not true’ and ‘no, no, no!’ while her famous line of ‘who is Davy Jones?’ brought laughter from the audience. (A reference to Caroline Watts whose phone conveniently fell into the North Sea.) David Connor as barrister David Sherborne gave an entirely convincing performance as the witty interrogator of Rebekah as he read in a dead pan voice some of her posts including the legendary line about Peter Andre: ‘Peter’s hung like a small chipolata, shaved, slobbery, lasts five minutes.’
Sonia Chery as Coleen Rooney had a believable Liverpudlian accent – and although quietly spoken in comparison to Rebekah – defended herself with conviction despite her story of the wronged woman becoming slightly undone under questioning by Hugh Tomlinson QC (a poker-faced Sam Ward). Keeping order was Mrs Justice Steyn (Katie Weir) who must have wondered at times if she wasn’t presiding over a couple of squabbling fish wives* outside a pub on a Saturday night. If there was a baddie in the grubby goings on it was Rebekah’s PR guru – the alarmingly scary Caroline Watt played with an airy swagger by Diane Lukins whose advice she took in her search to smear her closest friends. Or should I just say WAGS?
Harptree Robertson – the family liaison officer for the FA – who was bad-mouthed by Rebekah in the trial was played by Christine Cuthbert who had the task of representing someone who wasn’t a liar, a manipulator or a fraud – in other words normal people.
The two pundits Jude Wilson and Phil Saunders – gave energy and comedy as summarisers suddenly breaking up the stiff legal questioning with their zany footballing banter. Phil was also the director of the play – a sort of player manager if you like – full credit for ‘getting though the season with out an injury’ if I can push the footballing analogy into extra time. His counter part was Pundit Jeff played in a breakout performance by Jude Wilson who oozed confidence and completely enveloped himself in the persona of the Sky TV Football anchor man Jeff Stelling. And he enjoyed himself for his briefest of impersonations of Jamie Vardy.
A shout out to Ryan Frewin as Wayne Rooney who took the stand and in a nervous Evertonian accent defended his wife from the legal questions with all the effectiveness of the America Samoa football team when they lost 1-10 to Australia in the World Cup qualifiers. It was one of the play’s highlights as Wayne has been lampooned as being a penny short of a shilling by the media and Ryan’s excellent portrayal of the ‘not all there’ footballer compounded that view.
The trial ended with the judge finding in favour of Coleen’s defence leaving Rebekah ‘sick as a parrot’ and with a legal bill of around two million pounds – but not a crushed ego – as she went on to make the most of her fame with more TV appearances while her husband still earns good money playing in the topflight in Italy. Just as well really.
Credit to Phil Saunders who must ‘be over the moon’ for pulling off a new genre of drama for ACT, and also to the behind-the-scenes team, including the production manager Lesley Williams who also had her work cut out making sure the costumes were as close as possible to those worn in the real-life trial. Also praise for Pete Homewood and Benjy Homewood for lighting – Pete has been lighting plays for ACT since he was a schoolboy – so excuse the pun – but he lights up every production with his skills. A dazzling production from ACT – full of wit and dead pan humour – an insight into how the other half live – and committed performances from the entire cast.
Harry Mottram
The play runs to Saturday.
*Apologies for the fish wives comment. Putting me in my place is this series on BBC Radio called The Fishwives’ Tale which I highly recommend: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/b05qfj1c
More on Axbridge Community Theatre at https://sites.google.com/site/axcomtheatre/home
Their next production is the JB Priestly play I have Been Here Before 25-28 March and in the Alma in Bristol 31 Mar-1 Apr, and Dick Whittington 25-28 Nov, 2026.
More what’s on Axbridge at https://www.harrymottram.co.uk/diary/
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