A DOLL’S HOUSE, PART 2

Impeccably acted by a admirably diverse cast, Lucas Hnath’s A Doll’s House, Part 2 would be another all-around International City Theatre winner if its midsection didn’t get bogged down in a talky rehashing of past events.

Henrik Ibsen fans will recall that the last time we saw Nora Helmer in the Norwegian playwright’s 1879 classic A Doll’s House, she’d gotten so fed up with her male chauvinist hubby Torvald that she walked out on him and their three children intending never to return.

Or at least that was the case until Hnath penned his 2017 sequel, set fifteen years after the Ibsen original.

No wonder then, that elderly servant Anne-Marie (Eileen T’Kaye) finds herself dumfounded when a knock on the door reveals Nora (Jennifer Shelton), grown glamorous as all get-out in the intervening decade and a half.

It turns out that Nora has become quite the successful writer, her pseudonymous first novel centering on a woman so suffocated in her societally approved marriage that she dares to do the unthinkable and bid her husband and family a not so fond farewell.

Unlike her doomed fictional heroine, however, an unhitched Nora has thrived, not only financially and romantically but as a role model for wives who, following her protagonist’s example, have summoned up the courage to seek fulfillment on their own.

Unfortunately for Nora, one of her readers’ disgruntled ex-husbands has not only uncovered the novelist’s identity but the disquieting news that Torvald (Scott Roberts) never did finalize their divorce, making Nora guilty of multiple extramarital affairs and fraudulent book contracts, that is unless she can convince her husband to sign those divorce papers at last.

Nora and Anne-Marie’s early exchanges crackle with humor and more than a few choice four-letter words, and it’s amusing to hear Nora declare with utmost certainty that within thirty years at most, marriage will be passé.

Then comes Torvald’s unexpected arrival and with it talk, talk, and more talk (much of it in extended monologs) about what went wrong between husband and wife, dialog that sounds more like Norwegian translated into English than the way native speakers would express themselves.

Later comes even more rehashing of the past, this time with Anne-Marie, and even more of the same with Nora’s now adult daughter Emmy (Nicolette Ellis), who shows up to confront the mother she never knew.

Fortunately for audiences in need of real dramatic sparks, these do arrive in the play’s final Nora vs. Torvald showdown, a humdinger guaranteed to awaken anyone who might have come close to dozing off.

It helps enormously, too, that director Trevor Biship-Gillespie has elicited top-notch performances from a top-notch ensemble that has been cast with impressive diversity.

Shelton, whose glorious soprano has thrilled ICT (and Musical Theatre Guild) audiences more times that I could count once again proves herself a dramatic actress to be reckoned with, giving us a woman as radiant as she is steely, as vulnerable as she is fearless.

Casting Roberts as Torvald proves an inspired choice as well, the actor’s all-around good guy persona making it harder to take sides in the husband-wife dispute than it would be with a more antipathetic leading man.

SoCal theater treasure T’Kaye is a salty-tongued delight as Anne-Marie, and L.A. theater newcomer Ellis proves a captivating find as a daughter with more than enough reason to resent a long-absent mother.

Though I found Yuri Okahana-Benson’s set rather too bare for my tastes, it is exactly what the playwright has asked for. (A table and chairs and not much else.)

Jeff Polumas’s sound design, Kimberly DeShazo’s period costumes, Patty and Gordon Briles’ properties, and Anthony Gagliano’s hair and wig designs are all first-rate, with special mention due Donny Jackson’s stunning lighting design.

Donna R. Parsons is production stage manager and Glennis Leigh is assistant stage manager. Abel Rock and Jasmine Vigil are assistant directors. Casting is by Michael Donovan, CSA and Richie Ferris, CSA. Lucy Pollak is publicist.

Though hit and miss as a piece of writing, A Doll’s House, Part 2 does at the very least offer four meaty roles for actors to play, and play them quite splendidly the ICT cast does. And if you’ve seen Ibsen’s A Doll House, the simple fact that a sequel has been written may be reason enough to give Part 2 a go.

International City Theatre, Long Beach Performing Arts Center, 300 E. Ocean Blvd., Long Beach.
www.InternationalCityTheatre.org

–Steven Stanley
April 17, 2022
Photos: Kayte Deloma

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