"At just shy of 200 years old, Henrik Ibsen feels like a writer for the moment - full of passionate intensity, yet just as fiery in his skepticism and self-critique as in his moral conviction; grand and unsparing and perverse; equipped with an internal Geiger counter for sanctimony and bullshit. And while A Doll's House and Hedda Gabler tend to come around often enough in the contemporary theater,"
"That's a shame, because the play is an absolute barn burner. Weird and ferocious, very funny and brutally tragic, somehow both sardonic and mysterious, melodramatic yet deeply moving, it marks a turning point in Ibsen's writing. Before it came the epic early works, Brand and Peer Gynt, and what critics often call the "social plays" like A Doll's House and An Enemy of the People. In its wake, things would get stranger and murkier, intentionally so."
Henrik Ibsen's work combines passionate intensity, moral skepticism, and relentless self-critique, remaining strikingly relevant despite its age. The Wild Duck is a weird, ferocious play that balances humor and brutal tragedy while marking a stylistic turning point from epic and social dramas toward darker, murkier territory. The play deliberately recasts the idealist as a villain, portraying the defender of truth as a human wrecking ball whose pursuit of honesty brings blood and chaos. Contemporary stagings in New York have varied, with at least one production described as uneven early on but ultimately effective in conveying Ibsen's energy and moral complexity.
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