A Tightly-Woven Doll's House

Nora Helmer seems like a perfectly nice person. It’s the late 1870s. It’s Norway. She’s struggled a bit, but she seems to be clearing through into a much smoother domestic situation as her husband has just been promoted at work and she won’t have to worry about money. She’s about to find out just how wrong she is about that in A Doll’s House. The classic late 19th century drama makes its way to the Broadway Theatre Center’s Studio Theatre. A dazzlingly complex Jennifer Vosters cunningly inhabits the stage as Nora in a thoroughly captivating adaptation of Ibsen’s play by playwright Amy Herzog.


Vosters maintains an overall sense of energy and excitement in the role of Nora as she receives various guests including a charming Anand Nagraj in the role of family friend Dr. Peter Rank and Kristine Lind--an old friend of hers played with poise and strength by Kat Wodtke. Nora seems to be a perfectly happy wife and mother on the surface of things, but there is a great deal going on underneath the surface for a woman who is clearly a survivor above all else. Josh Krause shows admirable bravery in the role of Nora’s husband Torvald. He can come across like a bit of a monster at times in places, but Krause maintains a diligent focus on Torvald’s motivations beyond the character’s more sinister side. Matt Bowden play to a much darker and more desperate end of humanity in the role of Torvald’s co-worker Nils.


Herzog distills Ibsen’s work into a remarkably concise 105 minutes without intermission. Ibsen’s deep look into the nature of domestic servitude and the challenges facing women in the late 18th century continues to echo hauntingly into the present day and beyond as a small sub-culture of post-modern women look to try to define themselves as “trad wives.” The tiny world that Ibsen rendered in A Doll’s House is so stunningly simple. As complicated and intricate as Nora is, her and her situation speaks to certain universals the speak to everything from the twisted nature of ambition and power to some of the horrifying elements of capitalism and so much more. Director Leda Hoffmann has done an impressive job of keeping the drama close to the heart with the assembled ensemble while maintaining a solid grounding for all of Ibsen’s loftier intellectual themes. Scenic Designer Lisa Schlenker keeps the set quite well-defined and earthbound as a simple room in a simple house. There’s an interesting choice that’s been made with the staging that allows members of the cast to sit in chairs that are visible onstage around the edges of the set.Typically this might come across as a bit of a distraction, but it DOES maintain the ever-present social grounding of the challenges facing Nora as the play progresses. 


Milwaukee Chamber Theatre’s production of The Dollhouse continues through Feb. 9 at the Broadway Theatre Center’s Studio Theatre on  158 N Broadway. For more information, visit Milwaukee Chamber Theatre online.