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Regional Reviews: St. Louis Dollhouse by Three Manufacturers Also see Richard's reviews of Madam and The Details
The themes and roughly half the dialog are still intact, though the Norwegian classic now dances by in just 100 minutes, thanks to careful trimming and brisk pacing (with no intermission). Act one, directed by Miranda Jagels Felix, is the most surreal of the three, with a chorus periodically knotted together to reinforce social norms, hissing harsh morality in their doll-like poses. Act two, directed by Spencer Lawton, is the most straightforward, in which all of Nora's secret plotting (to save an ailing husband) begins to crush her like a boa constrictor, simply by using Ibsen's own immortal construction. And in a newly satirical third act, lots of insistent "in-the-moment" TV commercials and a huge video projection of the action on stage add a freakish, corrupting sitcom layer, thanks to director Jimmy Bernatowicz. Hailey Medrano is great, increasingly panicked but still playfully effervescent, as Nora. At one point (attempting a tarantella), she goes thrashing around as if she were trying to free herself from a straightjacket. Frankie Ferraro smiles maddeningly as her husband Torvald. In fact, everyone in Felix's sly first act has nightmarish grins and glassy, vacant eyes, along with useless doll's arms: half bent and only half reaching out. Even Ms. Medrano starts out as a children's toy, starting us out on a bitter note. Act two, directed by Mr. Lawton, shows that Ibsen is still more than up to the challenge of any modern stage visionaries you'd care to toss at him. Director Lawton allows the actors to shine, with Ross Rubright as a weak and dying Dr. Rank. And in spite of his intelligence, Rank is further withered here by his own bemusement at having overestimated the maturity of the object of his affections. There's no choreographer listed for the production, but there are great big chunks of fun dancing, especially in a marathon solo by Andrew Bayer as Nils Krogstad, and when Ms. Ferraro executes her own perfect tarantella, in one of a hundred dominance exercises over Nora. Victoria Thomas plays Christine, Nora's widowed childhood friend. She's pleasant but enigmatic, and matter-of-fact as she explains all of Nora's machinations right back in her face. Mr. Bayer is terrific as Krogstad, a paper-pushing lawyer at Torvald's bank who has caught on to Nora's loan fraud. In this second segment we're confronted, not by additional technique, but by a fierce devotion to the crashing waves of the source material. Morgan Schindler is pert and businesslike as the nanny, with a fleeting glimpse of heartbreak over her own faraway daughter. And Molly Wennstrom is the Mistress of Ceremonies, singing charmingly before the show, accompanied by Joe Taylor at the grand piano. Later she'll warm up the audience before a weirdly spectacular final 30 minutes. Lots of 1950s and '60s TV spots and jingles seem to jam-up the tense confrontations of act three but also add a strange new layer of "commercialism" that hems Nora in. And for a while, it looks like the women's movement has sold out along with her. She's swept up by crass consumerism, extolling mid-century coffee and soap and cigarettes along with her TV self in the larger projected images. Today, one's mind is suddenly filled with visions of independent women defining themselves with Birkin bags and mani-pedis, even as feminism falters. But still, she breaks free. And what George Bernard Shaw once called "the door slam heard 'round the world" bangs as loud as ever. Dollhouse by Three Manufacturers, produced by Equally Represented Arts, runs through August 9, 2025, at the Chapel on Alexander, 6238 Alexander Drive, St. Louis MO For tickets and information, please visit www.eratheatre.org. Cast: Production Staff: |
