Review – A Doll’s House – Donmar Warehouse

Just when you think social media is just a bunch of garbage, you get a tweet from the Donmar Warehouse letting you know that a show you failed to book before it sold out (two months before it opened) has had some seats released. SWEET! And that is how I managed to make it to A Doll’s House last night. I feel like a fool that I wasn’t able to commit to £15 tickets much earlier than I did, but after reading the West End Whinger’s review, I realized I’d made a mistake I was likely to regret for a long time and needed to remedy it – yet without stooping to day standing seats (a sure recipe for three days of aching feet). Saved by Twitter – who’da thunk it?

Because this show is so very sold out (though it’s running for three more weeks), there seems little point in providing an extensive review. I loved that the new version (by Zinnie Harris) is set in England with politicians instead of in Norway with bankers; the painful freshness of being dragged through the papers for some pecadillo and just what you could expect to happen to your reputation if you were accused of fraud added a lot of energy to the text and, I think, led to far more laughs (and tensions) that you often get with Ibsen. And it sharply emphasized the shortcomings of David Hare’s Gesthemane – politicians can make for interesting plays, but the focus needs to be on human relations and timeless concerns, not on some flash-in-the-pan scandal everyone will have forgotten in two months. Of course, Ibsen is a master of social ties, and creates characters who are so real you can pretty well imagine what they were doing before the play started and even twenty years later – not really Hare’s forte but one which makes the question of how will Nora’s husband respond? a matter of vital importance to the theatrical audience. This is expecially impressive given that, well, I knew exactly how he would respond … and it still hurt to see it. Ouch!

Gillian Andersen (Nora) was gorgeous and a bit fluffy as Nora -for some reason, it seemed to me that she had a bit of Marilyn Monroe in her portrayal. She was, however, absolutely convincing as a woman whose husband was vitally sexually interested in her and as someone who could have lived the coddled life she’d had quite happily for a decade. Toby Stephens “Thomas,” Nora’s husband, I couldn’t help but call him Torvald when discussing the play later) had a bit of work trying to portray someone who’s an unbelievable prig and rather unsympathetic … but he generally handled the twists and turns (of self-deception) well, and actually managed to be completely pathetic at the end. And, gosh, Tara Fitzgerald (Nora’s friend Christine Lyle) and Christopher Eccleston (Kelmer) actually made what I thought was a throwaway plot point when I read the script ages ago seem extremely vital (I kind of want to re-read it to see how Ibsen had originally developed it – and surely Christine wasn’t such a socialist?). Actually, the cast was just really good, as was the show – which means – maybe you ought to break down and go for the day seats, and as for me, I think I’m going to gloat a bit for getting to see this gorgeous show in this lovely, intimate space. Yay Team Donmar!

(This review is for a performance that took place on June 22nd, 2009. A Doll’s House continues through July 18th at the Donmar.

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Tags: a doll's house, Christopher Eccleston, Donmar Warehouse, Gillian Anderson, great plays on now in London, I have it as a goal to see all plays by Ibsen, ibsen, Tara Fitzgerald, Toby Stephens, Zinnie Harris