‘Hedda Gabler’: A Woman at War With Love

In Casey Biggs and Jeannine Welles’ new adaptation of Henrik Ibsen’s “Hedda Gabler,” a former society darling strikes out angrily at her boring marriage only to increase the measure of her folly. This handsome Hudson Guild production is filled with subtle nuances and irony, well played by a skillful cast.

Only five months into her marriage, Hedda (Alyssa Bresnahan) spits out “love” as “a nauseating word.” She quivers with brittle disgust for her lovingly doltish husband, George (Daniel Nathan Spector), and his well-meaning Aunt Juliana (Eve Brenner), who raised him.

George is a specialist who loves digging in libraries and putting other people’s papers in order. He buys a house and lovely things “for Hedda’s sake.”

With barely repressed disgust, Hedda confides in her friend, Judge Brack (Gary Sloan), that she is desperately bored and filled with self-loathing for being “much too afraid of scandal.” Brack suggests alternatives and complications that Hedda only deflects.

When Hedda’s old flame and George’s former academic rival, Eilert Lovborg (Robert Cicchini), appears riding on a wave of public popularity over his recent publication, Hedda plots his destruction.

Ibsen’s play is just over a century old. While much has changed, so much remains the same. Hedda

is trapped in a world where men make the rules and wield the power, yet she has no concrete wants apart from her desire “to be free of everything ugly.” She is the source of her own dissatisfaction, her anger recycling and increasing.

Bresnahan’s Hedda is a woman trapped by circumstances and her own limitations, suffocating under the good-natured affection of her husband. Spector plays George as part buffoon, part absent-minded professor. Totally oblivious to the icy calculations of his wife and the judge, his George sees only the best in people. He’s happy in his ignorance.

This adaptation flows effortlessly. As director, Biggs deftly suggests the unsaid--why Hedda both loves and hates Eilert and why his friendship and salvation by another woman pains her.

Biggs’ staging never seems crowded despite the clear limitations of the venue. In the cramped confines of this performance space, Biggs suggests both a physically comfortable life for George and a psychologically restrictive one for Hedda. J. Greg Veneklasen enlarges the space to great advantage. Roslyn Moore’s costumes are finely detailed and thoughtfully conceived.

BE THERE

“Hedda Gabler,” Hudson Theatre, 6543 Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood. Thursdays-Saturdays, 8 p.m. Ends Nov. 22. $15. (888) 566-TIXX. Running time: 2 hours, 30 minutes.