Writer: Stef Smith
Director: Bryony Shanahan
Ibsen’s A Doll’s House is the story of Nora, dutiful wife and mother, who fights to establish her individuality in a male-dominated world. Whether he intended it or not (and by all accounts, he denied the intention), Ibsen wrote a powerful feminist play, in which he plays with notions of financial control and ownership, of marital duty, secrets and single-mindedness. Its lasting relevance makes it one of the most performed plays in the world… So, it’s difficult to really understand the motivation to create a contemporary adaptation.
Stef Smith’s play casts three women as Nora, women of their time from 1918 (Kirsty Rider), 1968 (Jodie McNee) and 2018 (Yusra Warsama). They all play both Nora and her friend Christine, switching roles, and from dialogue to third-person narrative constantly and, for the most part, fairly seamlessly. It’s initially an interesting theatrical device but quickly wears thin, with predictable updated references (a telegram becomes a mobile phone) and language (the 2018 Nora says ‘fuck’ a lot) as though we need to be constantly reminded we’re seeing Nora as every-woman from every age. The depressing part about this is that it suggests that the lot of women is ultimately unchanged.
As it very often does, the Royal Exchange’s in-the-round stage creates as many problems as opportunities. At times it is difficult to hear the pacy dialogue when characters are facing the opposite side of the stage. Facial expressions are lost. Key moments are blocked by other actors. Director Bryony Shanahan, like almost all Directors using this space, feels the need for the characters to pace around for the sake of it, and even throws in chaotic and awkward moments of physical theatre. The all too occasional moments of stillness (like when Jodie McNee’s Nora talks about her caesarean scar) show how much more powerful Smith’s script could be if it wasn’t played at such a frantic pace.
The men are a pitiful lot. Smith and Shanahan haven’t been kind to them in the script or the direction. William Ash’s Thomas is an unlikely husband to Nora and an unconvincing bully. Naeem Hayat’s Daniel is hard to pity with his ‘hope can be so cruel’ take on things. Although Andrew Sheridan’s Nathan is suitably weaselly and has a credible air of edgy desperation about him.
Designer Amanda Stoodley also uses the space fairly predictably with a rotating stage, built with angular white sheet metal and scattered with unnecessary clutter – mismatched, ugly furniture and a tray of liquor bottles and glasses on a small table. The whole thing looks hastily assembled. We wait the whole length of the play for the taut red strings around the perimeter to twist together, and when it happens the result is visually and metaphorically disappointing.
The whole thing leaves you feeling that a solid production of Ibsen’s original play would be ultimately much more satisfying. Having multiple Noras doesn’t give the character any more poignance or depth than one good one would. All three actors have such brief moments to fully inhabit the character that her essence is all but lost. However, there’s enough of Ibsen’s original essence here to ensure that Nora: A Doll’s House raises all the right questions. It has something important to say, it just gets far too caught up in itself to say it clearly.
Runs until 2 April 2022
The Reviews Hub Score
clumsy
