Cruel but shamefully enjoyable: Vardy v Rooney – the Wagatha Christie Trial reviewed

The Wagatha Christie affair began in 2019 when Coleen Rooney accused Rebekah Vardy of selling stories from her private Instagram account to the Sun. Rebekah denied the charge and sued Coleen. The case reached the High Court last summer and has now arrived in the West End in a verbatim script by Liv Hennessy.

The staging is brilliantly funny with the court presented as a football pitch where a set of TV pundits explain the legal niceties to us. Rebekah, the plaintiff (and husband of former England striker Jamie Vardy), is cross-examined by David Sherborne of 5RB chambers who acts for Coleen. Sherborne begins by attacking Rebekah’s claim that she never leaks personal information by reminding her of a tabloid story about her former lover, Peter Andre. ‘A miniature chipolata,’ was her description of his reproductive equipment. It gets worse for her as Sherborne reveals how she sucked up to Coleen in public but plotted privately to milk her for gossip. The crowd reacts to Rebekah’s faltering testimony like a mob at a public execution, jeering explosively at every half-truth and evasion that falls from her lips. It’s a cruel but shamefully enjoyable experience.

When Coleen takes the stand she faces Hugh Tomlinson of Matrix Chambers who sets out to expose her as a scheming truth-twister. He suggests that she can’t be trusted because she used falsehoods to entrap Rebekah. ‘Why were you not honest?’ he asks pointedly. ‘Because I didn’t want to be,’ says Coleen. And how, he demands to know, could you possibly sift through 300 private Instagram accounts? ‘It’s quite easy on a mobile phone,’ she explains. She seems to regard Tomlinson as a bit thick and she helpfully informs him how she tracks down stories about herself in the newspapers. ‘I open Google and type in “Coleen Rooney news”’ More eruptions of laughter greeted this because her demeanour shone with a simple and unbiased frankness.