More Brecht Than Ibsen

Hedda Gabler: A Play with Live Music – TUTA Theatre

It’s always interesting and kind of fun to shake things up a bit, especially with a play. When a time-honored play has been adapted and produced in a fresh, starkly different style, it earns some attention. But when the drama is a groundbreaking classic that’s stood the test of time, a new interpretation becomes a little risky. If the writer can offer some new insight into the original work by updating it, then it makes sense to craft a new adaptation. Otherwise, it’s simply merely showing off.  

In offering a new twist on Ibsen’s classic, Jacqueline Stone, the co-founder and Artistic Director of TUTA, has not only written her own unique adaptation of this 1891 Norwegian drama, attempting to bring it into the twenty-first century, but she’s also chosen to direct this premiere, as well. Ms. Stone is the first to guide her own literary creation and give it life, without worrying that it’s being compromised by another director. However, in almost every instance where the author has directed her own work, it’s impossible to remain objective about the piece since the playwright/director is so close to the script. 

Making her vision even more unusual and contemporary, Ms. Stone has commissioned composer, musician and singer Wain Parham to create a strangely, anachronistic punk rock score for the play. The primarily electronic music is played by Parham and his two other band members, all clad in black and wearing eerie, white face masks. The five songs are sung entirely by leading actress, Lauren Demerath, who plays the title character. Except for providing shock value, the music doesn’t add anything new to the play.

Ibsen’s plot remains basically the same. As the play begins, Berta, the family housekeeper, is readying George and Hedda Tesman’s newly-acquired villa while accommodating George’s devoted Aunt Juliana. She’s arrived to welcome her nephew and his new, second wife, back from their extended honeymoon trip. Hedda is the arrogant, spoiled daughter of the late, aristocratic General Gabler. She has a jealous streak, demanding expectations, expensive tastes and a reputation for being difficult and exacting. George Tesman is a bland, but respected historian and writer. Clearly Hedda’s married him only for his money and social standing. He returns home to Kristiania, Norway,  expecting to win an appointment to the university. However, George learns that Eilert Lovberg, his academic rival and Hedda’s former lover, is also being considered for the same university position. He tells Hedda that if he isn’t hired for the collegiate job, they’re going to have to cut back on expenses. This news doesn’t make his new wife very happy.

The Tesman home is soon visited by several old friends and acquaintances. They include Thea Elvsted, Hedda’s younger, vivacious schoolmate who, despite being married to an older gentleman, is still carrying a torch for Eilert Lovberg. She has, in fact, helped him gather the research for his new book and is hoping for a romantic attachment to develop. However Eilert remains enchanted by Hedda, despite her recent marriage. Another friend of the Tesmans, the lascivious Judge Brack, also stops by. He shamelessly flirts with Hedda, then invites Tesman and Lovberg to his late night stag party. Thea insists upon waiting at the Tesman’s for Eilert to return from the soiree, in order to walk her boarding house. 

George eventually arrives home from the Judge’s party during the early morning hours. He’s found the rough draft for Lovberg’s brilliant, new book, which the stumbling, drunk young writer accidentally dropped in the street. George has rescued the notes with the intention of returning them to Eilert. But Hedda would rather her husband secretly keep the material and use it to write his own the book. When George refuses, she destroys Eilert’s rough draft. Then she convinces Lovberg, since he has ruined his chances for a beautiful, perfect life, to take one of her father’s dueling pistols and commit suicide. What results is a tragic event that leaves the audience stunned.   

Ms. Stone’s production is unusual and shockingly unconventional. She’s trimmed parts of Ibsen’s script, possibly to make time for Mr. Parham’s five punk rock compositions. His songs appear to be a means for Hedda to musically express her feelings and emotions. Instead they just interrupt the flow of the play. Perhaps, if the music wasn’t so loudly amplified the audience could understand the lyrics. And there’s no reason for Lauren Demerath, who has a strong singing voice, to use a floor microphone. In this intimate space she can be easily heard.

Jacqueline Stone has directed her play with a particularly heavy hand. The blocking is unnatural, almost robotic. Actors are often seen in profile or facing upstage and away from each other when sharing conversations. The performers seem to deliver their lines in a total vacuum, rather than sharing the scene with their fellow actors. Despite there being plenty of seating, the performers sometimes either sit on the floor, squat on top of movable packing crates or perch precariously on a metal stool.  

The look of this production is strange, too. Strawdog’s performance venue has been reconfigured to stretch across the entire width of the playing space. Designed by Martin Andrew, his villa consists of three rooms, each draped with sheer curtains, the central one slightly masking the ever-present ghostly rock band. The Tesman’s new home is eclectically furnished, decorated with furniture from a variety of decades and styles. And, because the stage is so wide, unless a theatergoer is sitting dead center, it’s difficult to see the scenes at either end of the set. The costumes by Rachel Sypniewski are equally as bizarre. She’s designed a Victorian-inspired wardrobe for her characters, but with a nod to punk culture. Later in the play, Eilert returns to the Tesman house dressed only in his underwear, and for no apparent reason, except shock value. Keith Parham’s lighting is often stark, moody and filled with shadows. At other times, he employs rock concert lighting that pulsates, rotates and blinds the audiences with its brilliance.

The actors all portray a range of unlikable characters, with whom no one would ever want to spend very much time. Several of the actors are excellent in their craft. Lauren Demerath makes a strong, lovely and smugly self-entitled Hedda; Tom Dacey Carr, creates a smarmy, slickly manipulative and immoral Judge Brack; and Kevin V. Smith is appropriately sexy and enigmatic as an intellectually gifted writer who finds solace in alcohol in order to quiet his inner demons. The rest of the company all do a nice job of helping tell this atypical version of Henrik Ibsen’s tragic play. 

This production is nothing, if not ambitious. TUTA’s presentation somewhat succeeds in its mission to present a contemporary, new look at Henrik Ibsen’s well-known drama. However, the staging feels clunky and mechanical; the characters come off as unrealistic; and the music feels like it was added as a novelty. What was once revered as a nineteenth century classic of theatrical realism is presented here as a lengthy, sometimes confusing, expressionistic drama with music that’s more Bertolt Brecht than Henrik Ibsen.

Somewhat Recommended

Reviewed by Colin Douglas

Presented February 25-March 29 by TUTA Theatre at Strawdog Theatre Company, 1802 W. Berenice Ave., Chicago.

Tickets are available at the box office or by going to www.tutatheatre.org.

Additional information about this and other area productions can be found by visiting www.theatreinchicago.com.