by Kim Solow
Last week, we went over the technical aspects of the play with the Costume Designer, Scenic Designer, Film Designer and Composer. I found the common threads that all the technical aspects tried to achieve in the world of the play were very interesting as well as their individual interpretation of the play. With the costumes, Nora’s dresses and accessories have a constricting feeling to them and, in the final scene when she leaves, she has a looser dress that allows her to drop this impediment and run free. In the set, the apartment is cramped, which gives the feeling of compressed space and a close community that can watch their every move. The music also imparts this feeling in some of the songs by a lack of melody, which creates an uneasy feeling and feels as though there’s no space within the room.
There is also the common thread that delves deeper into Torvald and Nora’s relationship than what is present in the text. In the beginning of the play, the set and Nora will be wrapped like a gift and he will walk in and open the apartment and her up. Nora’s costume for the tarantella conveys a strange sense of how Torvald wants her to look as he shows her off to the other men. Her tarantella costume is also very tight and has strands of material across it that make it seem as though Nora is tightly controlled like a puppet. The video will replay Nora and Krogstad’s interaction so that we can see how her guilt is endless and her fear of Torvald finding out. Similar to the film, there is a song called “Churning,” which imparts a circular feeling though the repetition of the same notes and melodies.
The technical aspects are all very unique and create a fascinating world for this play to take place in. I am excited to see them start to materialize and how they will integrate with the rehearsal process.