Erin Harrington reviews A Doll’s House, written by Henrik Ibsen, translated by Christopher Hampton, directed by Melanie Luckman, at the Court Theatre, Saturday 12 October 2024.
Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House is a classic piece of realist theatre, one that’s interested in exploring the nuances of human behaviour in a manner free from fantasy and artifice. The Court hasn’t tackled such a hefty 19th century play since their production of Anton Chekov’s Uncle Vanya in 2017. This makes Christopher Hampton’s lauded translation a welcome piece of canonical programming as the organisation looks towards its shift into the centre of the city. The production, directed by Melanie Luckman, is also an opportunity for the company to showcase the best of its impressive production design capabilities while they are still in the Shed.
Ibsen’s work, which probes social status, comfort, and debt, is also an oddly fitting choice in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis. When we first meet cheerful wife and mother Nora Helmer (Acushla-Tara Kupe) on Christmas Eve, we see her as frivolous, money-hungry and out of touch with her own privilege – especially in relation to her old friend, struggling widow Kristine (Hester Ullyart). Nora is childlike, playing to the expectations of her loving but patronising banker husband Torvald (Jonathan Price), and the affections of terminally ill family friend Dr Rank (Roy Snow). She romps around with the children. She is also hiding a secret debt, taken out fraudulently with disgraced bank employee Nils Krogstad (Cameron Douglas). This is at odds with laws against wives borrowing without a male guarantor – and her husband’s black and white perceptions of morality.
Through unexpected circumstance, Nora is faced with blackmail – and potential personal ruin. Anxious music and sound design from Amy Straker and Matt Short uses breathy, bird-like vocal work to mark her uncertain state of mind and fluttering thoughts. This crisis becomes the catalyst for a personal reckoning, in which Nora must take stock of her life, and her roles as wife, daughter, and mother.
The production is set in 1879, the year of the play’s premiere, and it is stunningly designed. Set designer Julian Southgate’s period Norwegian sitting room is richly detailed. Through a clever use of forced perspective, it offers a spacious sense of well-heeled comfort that becomes increasingly claustrophobic as action plays out, drawing our eyes towards the play’s all-important doors. We get a strong sense of the depth and scale of the house’s levels and hallways; it feels perfectly lived in. Jo Bunce’s responsive lighting design balances low winter sun, cool evening shadows and warm internal light.
Costume designers Pauline Laws and Pam Jones have outdone themselves, particularly in the design and execution of the women’s dresses, and Nora’s children’s delightful indoor clothes. The pair have such a talent for detailed period costuming that works well on the broad stage, communicating character through subtle colour, cut and drape.
The Court’s production leans unusually heavily into the play’s comic moments; from the opening it’s very light, even effervescent. The performance style, from the actors’ delivery of lines to their movement around the stage, has been directed with a distinctly contemporary, Kiwi, almost casual feel, so I was unsure about its take on period realism. It’s certainly entertaining, and there is a clear sense of warmth between the characters. At times, though, this undersells the very strict rules that form the invisible bars of the prison Nora comes to see herself within – rules relating to economic class, social status, etiquette and the gendered division of labour. This presents a challenge to the play’s emotional beats and sense of gravitas. It impacts our sense of the play’s stakes, and the heft of its exploration of the characters’ desperation and discontent, as well as Nora’s final transformational choices and search for self-worth.
Nonetheless, Acushla-Tara Kupe is a compelling performer who ably shoulders the play. Nora is a marathon role. Kupe shifts from sparkling charm, to bitter realisation, to grim determination. We’re with her as she realises how little she knows of herself, and her life. For all the play’s movement, I appreciate her stillness and silence as the play approaches its final moments.
Nora’s famous choice to reconsider the parameters of her marriage remains an evergreen interrogation of gender roles and social mores. There is clear artistic value in looking to the canon, alongside more contemporary programming, as the play still feels current 145 years on.
A Doll’s House runs at The Court Theatre until 9 November.
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