Late last year, Marti Lyons directed a confusing feminist version of “The Taming of the Shrew” at Court Theatre. Now she’s back home at Remy Bumppo Theatre Company, where she is artistic director, redeeming herself with a well-thought-out production of Henrik Ibsen’s “Hedda Gabler” that’s right on the money.
Using Christopher Shinn’s Broadway adaptation, based on the literal translation by Anne-Charlotte Hanes Harvey, Lyons condenses the 1890 play originally performed with two intermissions to a tight 90 minutes with no break. While some excess verbiage has been cut, especially passages that sound especially dated nowadays, nothing essential has been lost, as far as I can tell.
The real strength of the show is the complicated portrait of Hedda brought to blazing life by Aurora Real de Asua. Simultaneously a monster and a victim, she is a woman who is incapable of happiness and hell-bent on controlling those around her—or on destroying them if she can’t. She is her own worst enemy, and Real de Asua and Lyons make us feel what that means.
Hedda’s restlessness and frustration are evident from her first appearance when, just back from her honeymoon and bored, she complains about the flowers all over the sitting room and insults the hat that poor Aunt Juliane, played with just the right amount of annoying fussiness by Annabel Armour, has left on a chair. She also squirms, irritated, out of the arms of her clueless husband Jorgen Tesman (Eduardo Curley) every time she tries to compliment her on how she’s filled out.
Hedda’s efforts at manipulation soon focus on Mrs. Thea Elvsted (Gloria Imseih Petrelli), the former schoolmate with beautiful hair she threatened to burn off, who shows up worried about Ejlert Lovborg (Felipe Carrasco), a formerly disgraced alcoholic and womanizer whose new book has created a sensation and put him in competition with Mr. Tesman for an important academic position. Lovborg is Hedda’s former flame, and Mrs. Elvsted is Tesman’s from before he met Hedda. It also turns out that Lovborg, who met Thea while tutoring her children, has been rehabilitated by her, and she has become his muse and collaborator, especially on a forthcoming book about the future of which he’s most proud.
Enabled by the insidious Judge Brack (Greg Matthew Anderson), a would-be confidant with an agenda of his own, Hedda exploits her quarry’s weaknesses and prompts Lovborg to fall off the wagon. He goes off to Brack’s party with Tesman, bringing his new manuscript with him and, as they say, disaster ensues.
Hedda’s determination to control Lovborg’s destiny leads her to destroy his manuscript and urge him to commit suicide, but — because she is a romantic at heart, or so it seems here — she wants him to do it beautifully. At the same time, she lies to her husband about the manuscript, saying she burned it for him.
Unfortunately, her plan backfires spectacularly, from the sordid way Lovborg kills himself to the fact that guilt-ridden Tesman dedicates himself to helping Mrs. Elvsted recreate the book from the notes she kept. This leaves Hedda to the mercy of Judge Brack, who knows what really happened and craves an affair. The Tesmans also are beholden to him financially, and even though Brack promises not to abuse his power, Hedda finds the situation unbearable.
Whether her solution is cowardice or bravery is left up in the air, although the consensus, as it is for other shocking behavior in the play, is that people just don’t do that.
While most of the performances are strong, the standout besides Real de Asua’s Hedda is Anderson’s Judge Brack. He’s just dangerous and creepy enough to explain how she puts up with him — and even is captivated — until she isn’t.
Joe Schermoly’s conventional scenic design, mostly in shades of mauve, doesn’t strike me as what Hedda would have chosen for herself, but maybe that’s the point, because we’re told that Judge Brack furnished the house, with Aunt Juliane’s help, while the Tesmans were on their six-month-long honeymoon. Max Grano De Oro’s lighting, Christopher Kriz’s music and sound design and Kotryna Hilko’s costumes are serviceable, or better.
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