THEATER
Theater for a New Audience
A Doll's House - Henrik Ibsen
We saw The Father two weeks ago. Today we see A Doll's House. Heavy, deep stuff.
“Primal…Suspenseful…Achingly clear… To see [Ibsen’s A DOLL’S HOUSE and Strindberg’s THE FATHER] in tandem is to experience two of modern theater’s most influential minds locked in fierce dialogue … Ms. Arbus makes sure that we can hear — but really hear — what everyone in each play is saying… what I love about Ms. Arbus is she leads you into insights without pushing…she lets us see how two literary geniuses dealt with one subject, to notice the similarities as well as the differences.” – The New York Times, Critics Picks
[Four stars] “Celerity, clarity, accessible, universal resonance.” – Time Out New York, Critics’ Pick
“This inspired double billed pairs two plays about marriage from two Scandinavian titans… a flash point about for new ideas about gender and political self-determination…in a virtuosic turn, Maggie Lacey and John Douglas Thompson play both Nordic couples.” – The New Yorker
Drama Desk Award winner Maggie Lacey (Horton Foote’s The Orphans’ Home Cycle at Signature Theatre) and John Douglas Thompson, returning to TFANA after his groundbreaking performance in Tamburlaine the Great (Drama Desk and Obie Awards), star in two provocative dramas about marriage.
Ibsen’s A Doll’s House adapted by Thornton Wilder, which premiered on Broadway in 1937, plays alongside August Strindberg’s The Father, in a new version in English by Scottish author David Greig (Strindberg’s Creditors at BAM) commissioned by TFANA. Writing The Father in response to A Doll’s House, Strindberg offers his own startling vision of marriage and the battle of the sexes.
Review: Spouses Gasping for Air in Twinned Ibsen and Strindberg Plays
A DOLL'S HOUSE NYT Critics’ Pick Off Broadway, Drama
THE FATHER NYT Critics’ Pick Off Broadway, Drama
By BEN BRANTLEYMAY 25, 2016
A noise of primal desperation emanates from each of the two suspenseful dramas that have been resonantly paired in repertory by Theater for a New Audience. They are Ibsen’s “A Doll’s House” and Strindberg’s “The Father.” And there comes a moment about halfway through both productions when a solitary soul is heard gasping as if her last breath were at hand.
It’s the sound of a woman realizing that she is trapped. And that if she doesn’t act fast, the walls of her already claustrophobic world are going to crush her.
Both women — their names are Nora (in “A Doll’s House”) and Laura (in “The Father”) — are very capably portrayed by the same actress, Maggie Lacey. Their adversaries, who are also (but of course) their husbands, are embodied by the formidable John Douglas Thompson.
Since Mr. Thompson is one of the most commanding classical actors around, you would think that any performer pitted against him would be doomed to defeat. But in each instance, it’s the woman who wins, though the characters’ individual routes to victory speak volumes about the differences between the rivalrous playwrights who created them.
Yeah, I know. I’ve gone and spoiled the endings. (And while I’m at it, Oedipus’s wife is his mother, and Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker’s father.) But what’s most startling about Arin Arbus’s engrossing productions, which opened on Tuesday and Wednesday nights at the Polonsky Shakespeare Center in Brooklyn, isn’t their conclusions.
What really awakens the senses here is the feeling of suffocation that pervades two domestic battlefields, an impression of doom woven into the fabric of a social order. Seen on its own, each production makes this achingly clear.
But to see them in tandem is to experience two of modern theater’s most influential minds locked in fierce dialogue about the untenable position of Scandinavian wives in the late 19th century. I say Scandinavian and 19th century, but if the corset fits …
There’s nothing arbitrary about the pairing of “A Doll’s House” (1879) and “The Father” (1887). The Norwegian Ibsen and the Swedish Strindberg, who was 20 years the younger, were intensely aware of each other’s work. Ibsen even kept a portrait of Strindberg above his desk to gall him into creativity, while Strindberg was infuriated by Ibsen’s celebrity.
Indeed, “The Father” was written as a retort to “A Doll’s House,” which Strindberg described as “swinery,” filled with logical potholes and tendentious argument. He also felt that Ibsen had grossly weighted his play in the woman’s favor.
Or to quote the title character in “The Father,” as newly adapted by the Scottish playwright David Greig, on the subject of the dead patriarch in another Ibsen play, “Ghosts”: “Watching it, I couldn’t help but wonder what Mr. Alving might say if only he could claw his way out of the coffin. So many ex-husbands cold in their graves, so many women telling their tales.”
Those lines are delivered by Mr. Thompson late in “The Father,” and by that time, his character, the Captain, has just about reached the breaking point. During the previous hour, we have watched the Captain’s wife, Laura — with whom he’s been fighting over the education of their daughter, Bertha (Kimber Monroe) — systematically undermine her husband’s well-being. She has planted in his mind the toxic suspicion that Bertha might not be his biological child.
Given Strindberg’s reputation as a misogynist — and Mr. Thompson’s power in conveying raw torment — you might assume that your sympathies would lie entirely with the Captain. But Ms. Arbus’s interpretation and Ms. Lacey’s performance help insure that the argument here is by no means one-sided. If Laura is compelled to destroy her husband, it’s because she has effectively been his prisoner for so long.
Or as she says, in rueful triumph: “I wasn’t trying to hurt you. I was only trying to breathe.”
With some softening, that declaration could be spoken by the infantilized Nora to her husband, Thorwald (Mr. Thompson) at the end of “A Doll’s House,” when she comes to the realization that her seemingly happy marriage has been a lie. But it is to the credit of this interpretation, which uses Thornton Wilder’s 1937 version, that you feel not only for the painfully enlightened wife but also for the bewildered husband in torment.
Ms. Arbus, whose earlier work for Theater for a New Audience includes “Othello” and “Macbeth” with Mr. Thompson, is a refreshingly levelheaded director. Her first objectives are clarity and accessibility rather than sensationalism. When she did “King Lear” here last year, she presented Shakespeare’s violently divided royal clan as the dysfunctional family next door.
These twinned productions of Strindberg and Ibsen maintain a similarly low hysteria quotient (or as low as Strindberg allows), without sacrificing the plays’ anxious and compelling momentum. Using a solid doubled cast that includes Nigel Gore, Jesse J. Perez, Linda Powell and Laurie Kennedy (who’s marvelous as the fretful nanny in “The Father”), Ms. Arbus makes sure that we can hear — but really hear — what everyone in each play is saying.
Ms. Lacey’s ostensible ordinariness (she made her Broadway debut as Emily in “Our Town” in 2002) always makes her easy to identify with. She is more at ease as Nora, whom she endows with an innate shrewdness, but her calm, matter-of-fact portrayal of Laura keeps us from seeing the character as a castrating witch; we know where this woman’s coming from.
Mr. Thompson, whose presence always reads large, is hardly a natural choice for the small-minded Thorwald. But for that very reason, the character’s egotism has seldom seemed so daunting. His Captain in “The Father” is, in a word, brilliant, an exact and devastating portrait of one man’s inevitable collapse that brings to mind Mr. Thompson’s thrilling portrayal of “Othello.”
This was the first time that I have read or seen “The Father” that “Othello” came so specifically to mind. That’s what I love about Ms. Arbus as a director: It’s like having a dream teacher at your elbow as you navigate difficult classics, one who leads you into insights without pushing.
With these productions, she lets us see how two literary geniuses dealt with one subject, to notice the similarities as well as the differences, and to appreciate the qualifying detail used to draw characters often remembered as monolithic.
Can you identify the writer of the following? “There are two kinds of spiritual laws and two kinds of consciences — one for men and one for women. They do not understand each other, but in the practical matters of life women are judged by men’s law, as if they were not women, but men.”
That was Ibsen, speaking of “A Doll’s House” in a letter from 1878. But after seeing Ms. Arbus’s double feature, you may be excused for thinking that Strindberg might have written exactly the same words.
How Arin Arbus Revived a 130-Year-Old Debate About Feminism
Ibsen: “Marriage! Nothing else demands so much of a man.”
Strindberg: “Love between a man and woman is war.”Rarely have two plays been paired as effectively as A Doll’s House and The Father, two Scandinavian classics that recently played in repertory at Theatre for a New Audience’s exciting space in Brooklyn (they ran Apr. 30-June 12). Written only eight years apart (1879 and 1887, respectively), these late-19th-century masterpieces about marriage, seen side by side, have a stunning impact, offering penetrating, perturbing insights into the complexities of this social institution that resonate resoundingly today.
Moreover, they raise tantalizing questions about the intent of their respective authors, Henrik Ibsen and August Strindberg—contemporaries and rivals with a fierce love/hate relationship—not to mention curiosity about the source of these two plays in their own personal lives and relationships with women.
In A Doll’s House, a play that has been performed around the world as frequently as any by Shakespeare or Chekhov, a woman defies society and convention by leaving her husband because she cannot stay in the marriage and be true to herself. In The Father, a husband is driven mad by doubts planted in his mind by his wife as to his parentage of their only daughter, whose education and future he is determined to control. Both plays deal with the injustices that marriage imposes on women, and their lack of authority, equality, status and control both in society and in the home. And both dramatize titanic struggles between the husband and wife, with the latter triumphing in the end.
Or does she? And what kind of a victory is it? Seen side by side, these two provocative plays end up raising more questions than they answer—and therein lay the power of the pairing.
Fueled by fascination, I sat down with Arin Arbus, the brilliant young director whose brainchild it was to stage them together, and who did so with artistry and alacrity. Associate artistic director at TFANA since 2009, Arbus spoke of the genesis of this ambitious project, its challenges, and its discoveries.
CAROL ROCAMORA: What is the source of inspiration in your pairing of these plays?ARIN ARBUS: Initially, I was interested in the two plays separately, and didn’t realize how directly related they were. Then I started to find some interesting connections. Both plays are Scandinavian, both focus on marriage, both are set at Christmastime. Both are three act plays with a final climax; there’s Nora, there’s Laura, and so on. Then I did the research: The Father was actually Strindberg’s rebuttal to Ibsen’s A Doll House. As a young playwright, Strindberg worshipped the older Ibsen—but after he saw A Doll’s House, he was outraged by what he considered to be a scandalous attack on the male sex. In his collection of writings called Getting Married, Strindberg dedicates eight pages to a scene-by-scene analysis of the play, calling Nora a hussy and Torvald innocent. Strindberg even wrote a short story called “A Doll’s House” about a couple torn apart because the wife gets hold of a copy of the play and reads it!
Strindberg called Doll’s House “swinery” and its author “a decrepit old troll” and an “ignorant women’s writer.” Apparently, the clash between the writers became personal.Strindberg insists that his battle with Ibsen cost him his marriage, his children, his fortune and his career! Meanwhile, in response, Ibsen bought a portrait of Strindberg and placed it over his desk. Ibsen is reported to have said: “That lunatic is my mortal enemy and he will watch every word that I write!”
At the same time, they’re both drawing from their own personal relationships with women. Ibsen had a friend named Laura Kieler who, like his character Nora, needed to borrow money to save her husband’s health but couldn’t because of Norwegian law. She turned to Ibsen, who refused to help her. As a result she forged a check—and was found out. That’s the basis of A Doll’s House.Strindberg was married three times. Early on he was passionate about women’s causes, but after his first marriage (to a woman named Siri) he became violently anti-feminist! Evidently, Siri had an affair during their marriage, so Strindberg never was sure if their children were, in fact, his…
Just like the Captain in The Father.Yes. Both plays are ultimately about the cost of marriage on the children. But if Strindberg felt only hatred for women, he wouldn’t have been able to write any of his plays. The problem is that, at the same time, he also feels extreme love and need for women. He’s in awe of women; he marries three of them and then hates them and fights with them and gets driven crazy by them. His life was a mess—and that’s what makes him such a great playwright.
These striking similarities must have facilitated your casting of one ensemble to perform in both. You have a parallel pair of marriages, with two traditional, controlling husbands, Torvald and the Captain, and two wives, Nora and Laura, who find the strength to stand up to them.We don’t have a fixed company, but one of artistic director Jeffrey Horowitz’s great gifts is developing relationships with artists who return again and again. I knew John Douglas Thompson could play the Captain in The Father—he’s such a heroic, big-hearted leading man. On the other hand, I thought the role of Torvald wasn’t in his wheelhouse: Torvald is empty; he cares only about appearances. But knowing what a great actor John is, I was interested in seeing him in the role. After all, the play doesn’t work unless you get on board with Nora and Torvald’s marriage for a while. And of course Maggie Lacey is so convincing in both parts. The process was challenging for the entire company: We rehearsed The Father for two and a half weeks and then A Doll’s House for two and a half weeks. We all felt schizophrenic. Strindberg makes you feel sort of slimy, so to go from one world to another is tough—but thrilling.
How did you choose the translations/adaptations?Jeffrey knew of the Thornton Wilder adaptation of A Doll’s House. I read it and loved how concise it is. Wilder strips it to the essentials, and it feels very conversational and contemporary. Strindberg is tricky to translate. Jeffrey and I had admired David Greig’s adaptation of Strindberg’s The Creditors, so we reached out to David and commissioned it. It was fantastic to work with him in rehearsal, and discover what’s really happening in each scene. For me it was essential to have someone who could sculpt the play. It needed it.
You embraced the melodrama of both pieces, and with your fast-paced, high-pitched direction, it was as thrilling, breathtaking ride. What was the audience’s response to the pairing?The Father inspired hissing and booing at the misogyny of the play. There was clapping, gasping, laughter, and even cheering at crucial moments—it was wild! Audiences emerge polarized, some hating one character in The Father and some hating the other. Ibsen doesn’t have this effect. Because Ibsen was sane, he had a sane effect on audiences, and the response to A Doll’s House was more civilized. And of course there was applause at the final exchange:
Torwald: But no man would sacrifice his honor for the one he loves!
Nora: It is a thing hundreds of thousands of women have done!
What did you learn about both plays, in retrospect?It’s true that both were writing about “the woman’s question”—the big issue of the day. But once you look at the plays together, they seem to be writing about different things. Ibsen is writing about society—he’s a social critic, saying that if we could change our corrupt society, then men and women could create a true marriage. Strindberg, on the other hand, is writing about his perception of nature and human nature—namely the Darwinian battle between men and women, who are fundamentally different and who will always be at war with each other. Strindberg tried to reduce drama to its most elemental form. His characters may have been living in a civilized society, but they are ripping each other apart like animals, ferociously, psychologically.
You’re known for your accomplished direction of Shakespeare. How has this experience helped you grow as an artist?These are the first Off-Broadway shows I’ve directed that have not been Shakespeare. I’ve been doing Shakespeare at TFANA since 2009. Meanwhile, I’ve been wanting to work on other great writers, so this was exciting. My muscles are bigger as a result. And I feel I am closer to Ibsen and Strindberg as a result.
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