George Street Playhouse presents ‘A Doll’s House, Part 2’

Last month I wrote about my dissatisfaction with the Arden’s take on this Ibsen continuation, which seemed in their hands like an extended inside joke. Although the production featured some of the area’s most lauded actors — Grace Gonglewski, Steven Rishard, Joilet F. Harris — the various parts failed to coalesce into a satisfying whole. I questioned the quality of the play itself, which I quite liked when I saw the premiere production in New York.

A different house

What a difference a few weeks, and a different vision, can make. GSP’s assumption — staged by veteran actor Betsy Aidem, making an assured directorial debut — takes a more naturalistic approach, and nearly everything benefits from the shift in perspective. Gone is the piercingly loud, anachronistic music (although “Burning Down the House” by the Talking Heads plays cheekily over the curtain call) as well as the strobing lights, the Brechtian projected titles, and the general sense of Nora engaging in a highly performative cage fight with her past.

Instead, a subtle examination of the push and pull between progress and regression remains. Nora (the excellent Kellie Overbey) seems more conscious of her blind spots and the privilege she has enjoyed since leaving the confines of her marriage — she knows that while the world has changed for her, others have not been so lucky. Her pronouncements about the institution of marriage, the role of women in society, and the promise of liberation to come sound far less glib here.

True to Ibsen

Both Gonglewski and Laurie Metcalf, the role’s Tony-winning originator, envisioned Nora as a star role, a larger-than-life creation who cannot help but function as a chaos agent. Overbey’s work is far more nuanced and finely etched — less bravura perhaps, but more authentic. She seems aware from the moment she enters the home she famously left — hauntingly rendered by set designer Deb O and lighting designer Rick Fisher — that her presence will have a negative effect. She doesn’t apologize for taking up space, but she doesn’t flaunt her good fortunes either.

Aidem’s actor-focused direction amplifies the relationships between Nora and her former intimates. Andrew Garman plays Torvald with an appropriate inconspicuousness that masks a long-carried heartbreak. When he first recognizes his estranged wife after 15 years of separation, whatever brave front he constructed instantly vanishes. Their confrontation feels like the eruption of several decades’ worth of pent-up anger, resentment, and pain — rather than boulevard comedy, it’s acutely painful in a way that mirrors Ibsen’s original.

The privilege of choice

Ann McDonough similarly manages to find a wellspring of unforced pathos as the servant Anne Marie without losing any of the role’s humor. She greets Nora with a barely hidden exasperation, even while her social status reinforces an artificial sense of pleasantry. When Anne Marie finally hurls a harsh word at her former mistress, it’s both funny and chilling.

Hnath gives Anne Marie a voice in a way that even Ibsen couldn’t — by making her a central character, he reinforces that even in a story of liberation, not all women have the same choices open to them. A victim of class and circumstances, Anne Marie made difficult choices of her own that proto-feminist Nora couldn’t fathom. As worldviews become more intersectional, it feels essential that Nora awaken to the reality of her advantageous life.

The writing for Nora and her daughter, Emmy, remains the hollowest, although Lily Santiago gives a convincing, entertaining performance in the latter role. It dips too far into broad humor and intrigue, while glossing Emmy’s sense of abandonment. Her full-throttle rejection of Nora’s perspective is unconvincing.

On the whole, though, I’m willing to admit that I may have been prematurely dismissive of A Doll’s House, Part 2 and its value as a standalone work. Like its central character, the play itself has a compelling point of view and an undeniable spark. It just took some time, and a fresh perspective, for me to see it.

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