Sometimes it’s better to live with lies; the truth can be too destructive. That’s the message I came away with from “The Wild Duck,” which makes it hard for me to understand how the Theater for a New Audience thought this the right time to stage Henrik Ibsen’s rarely produced 1884 play.  

Maaike Laanstra-Corn as Hedvig, David Patrick Kelly as Old Ekdal, Nick Westrate as Hjalmar Ekdal, Melanie Field as Gina Ekdal, Alexander Hurt as Gregers Werle.

There is a solidity to this production of playwright David Eldridge’s 20-year-old adaptation, with fine ensemble acting and steady if sometimes stuffy direction by Simon Godwin.  But I can’t fully embrace “The Wild Duck,” and not just because of the timing. The behavior of Ibsen’s antagonist, Gregers Werle, is even more inexplicable.

We first meet Gregers (Alexander Hurt) in Act I, although it takes until Act V two hours later for the gun to go off (literally and metaphorically.)   In that first scene, he’s visiting his father, Håkon Werle (Robert Stanton), who is having a dinner party.  Gregers has stayed away from his hometown for years, we soon learn, out of anger and resentment towards his father. (Stanton’s performance offers a clue not explicitly in the script that the resentment may be mutual; he slaps his son’s head, or pokes him, in what at first seems to be a playful manner, but its frequency and increasing force suggest otherwise.) 

 Gregers’ anger is fueled by his mother having told him before she died that his father was having an affair; he also resents his father for having had his business partner take the fall for a crime Gregers suspects they both committed. That business partner, Old Ekdal (David Patrick Kelly), who went to jail, is the father of Hjalmar (Nick Westrate),  Gregers’ best childhood friend.  Gregers has invited Hjalmar to the party, and while catching up with Hjalmar, discovers new reasons to be angry at his father.

It eventually emerges that old Werle has engineered an arrangement that’s both generous and self-serving:  He gives Old Ekdal a salary for busy work, and both paid for Hjalmar’s education and set him up for his career as a photographer. The self-serving part: Werle also married Hjalmar off to Gina, Werle’s old housekeeper… and former mistress.

The remaining scenes take place in Hjalmar’s home, with the loyal and hardworking Gina (a persuasive Melanie Field) and their 14-year-old daughter Hedwig (a touching Maaike Laanstra-Corn) who adores her father. There is an apparent imbalance in the family dynamics – Gina seems to do most of the work, while Hjalmar invests his time and thoughts in coming up with an invention that he believes will provide a windfall for his family and redeem his father’s honor (which theatergoers are forgiven for suspecting from the get-go will never happen; with a more comedically-mind director, Hjalmar’s delusion could be played more overtly for laughs.) Still, the family seems reasonably happy, until Gregers embeds himself in the family (renting a spare room in their home) and decides it would be better for them if he told Hjalmar the truth. Doing so destroys the family.

Dr. Relling (Bobby Plasencia),  a neighbor, accuses Gregers of suffering from the disease of “chronic righteousness.” The doctor believes it better to prescribe what he calls the “life-lie.. If you take the life lie from an ordinary man then you take away his happiness as well.”

Relling seems to be speaking for Ibsen, warning against the downside of having “ideals,”  which is the word used in Eldridge’s script; these days cynics (or at least right-wing cynics) might substitute that with: being woke.  

It’s possible that Ibsen is not taking sides, that he’s simply presenting opposing viewpoints. This is the argument that the director has made, that the play is a debate over how much truth is too much. But that’s hard to buy given how much destruction Gregers wreaks.

It’s also possible that Gregers’ motives are not as idealistic as he presents them. One might try to make the case that he is in fact taking revenge, out of a misplaced anger and resentment toward his friend for betraying him (although Hjalmar was certainly not responsible for Werle’s largesse, nor aware of Werle’s motives.) 

But taking him at his word, Gregers’ supposedly well-meaning interaction with Hedwig is so appalling that I have to assume we’re meant to view it on a purely symbolic level. “The Wild Duck” is rife with symbolism. Its title character suffers mightily from it. Old Werle had shot the duck, but only winged it. Old Ekdal’s dog snatched it from the water, and then Ekdal stuck it in a basket in his loft, where Hedwig takes care of it. After Gregers’ revelations have soured Hjalmar on his family, even rebuffing his beloved daughter, Gregers then suggests that Hedvig kill the duck, promising that her sacrifice will prove to Hjalmar how much he really means to her. This leads to the shocking tragedy at the end.

 When you’re dealing with a play from the 19th century that’s been called a classic, written by a playwright who is routinely hailed as the father of modern drama, it can feel like a personal failing (insufficient sophistication! inadequate education!) to see a moment in the play as having jumped the shark.

I take heart in realizing that the part in “The Wild Duck” about Old Werle making his business partner Old Ekdal the fall guy for a crime they committed together reminded me of Arthur Miller’s “All My Sons,” and that the idea of a life with illusions as preferable to a life of despair made me think of Eugene O’Neill’s “The Iceman Cometh.” Both playwrights might well have been influenced by Ibsen, but both of their plays are simply better – or, if you prefer, more effective for a modern American audience, by which I mean me. 

The Wild Duck
TFANA’s Polonsky Shakespeare Center through September 28
A Co-Production with Shakespeare Theatre Company
Running time: Two and a half hours, including a 15-minute intermission
Tickets: $95-$125. $20 for students and under-30
Written by Henrik Ibsen in a new version by David Eldridge
Directed by Simon Godwin
Scenic designer Andrew Boyce, costume designer Heather Freedman, lighting designer Stacey Derosier, sound designer Darron L West, movement and fight director Jacob Grigolia-Rosenbaum, voice director Andrew Wade, hair and wig designer Satellite Wigs 
Cast: Katie Broadway as Pettersen, Melanie Field as Gina   Alexander Hurt as Gregers, Mahira Kakkar as Mrs. Serby, David Patrick Kelly as Old Ekdal, Maaike Laanstra-Corn as Hedwig, Bobby Plasencia as Relling/Captain Balle, Alexander Sovronsky as Jensen, Robert Stanton as Hakon Werle, Nick Westrate as Hjalmar Ekdal

Photos by Gary Goodstein and Hollis King.

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