A Dolls House

This is a complete updating of Ibsen’s classic early feminist creation at the Almeida, and I really wanted to like it.   Romola Garai is Nora, who, in this iteration, is married to a financier with a city boy made good vibe, (including the recovery from addiction).  He is just about to make it big by selling his company. 

Nora is an over-excited trophy wife when we first meet her, spending money that as her husband points out, they don’t have yet.  But she wants a good family Christmas and so Torvald (Tom Mothersdale) acquiesces.  But all is not as it seems.  Nora has secretly put them in debt to save her husband and family, but a blackmail plot and a flirtation make everything a lot more complicated.  

I appreciate the attempt to bring it up to date,and it is ostentatiously of the moment, including the delight of a  financier recognising that war will bring in big money for him.  The question of how to be a woman in today’s world is still a theme, but it isn’t really stifling middle class values that’s the problem in this iteration, but capitalism.  We do see modern patriarchy in action as Nora comments on how she is just performing roles, particularly as a mother, and we can also see that with her dancing in ‘that’ dress - a doll for the men’s pleasure.  So, despite having more choice and opportunity in theory, the modern Nora does still end up trapped in her gender role, even if it looks a bit different nowadays.

In theory this is all good, but despite great performances and some nice moments, it didn't quite hit for me.  While it was good to modernise, I felt it was sometimes trying too hard to be edgy (compared to Summerfolk currently playing at the NT) and the dialogue was pretty heavily laden with too much obvious meaning.  The other challenge is that pretty much everyone is unlikeable.

This was better in theory than in practice for me, but despite that I will still take any opportunity to see Romala Garai on stage.