geoff: "A doll's house," the
classic 19th-century play by
Henrik Ibsen, featuring one of
the most iconic characters in
theater history, Nora Helmer, a
young wife and mother who is
forced to question everything in
her highly-structured life.
It's now getting a new Broadway
adaptation starring one of
today's biggest stars, Jessica
Chastain.
Jeffrey brown has the story for
our arts and culture series,
canvas.
>> It feels like you're
incredibly exposed as an actor
because you're not given --
you're not able to hide behind
anything.
Jeffrey: In "A doll's house,"
Jessica Chastain takes on a
famous character in a new way.
In a stripped-down, no props or
period costumes production,
envisioned by director Jamie
Lloyd.
Chastain recalls an early
meeting to talk about his
approach.
>> He mentioned something about
no props.
I was like, what do you mean?
And it was very difficult for me
to even imagine.
The play as written begins with
her eating cookies, right?
And then in the very first
scene, her husband torvald asks
her, you look guilty, have you
been eating cookies?
And she says, no, I would never
do that to you.
Jeffrey: But you have no
cookies.
>> There's no cookies.
I'm not miming eating cookies,
there's just no cookies.
I said to Jamie, how -- I don't
understand how to do this.
Like, we say in the very first
scene that I'm not honest, I
swear that I would never do that
to my husband, and the audience
has just seen that I have.
We're not given that opportunity
to do that now.
And he goes, you'll do it in the
acting.
I'm like, oh, my god.
>> When I saw that clip with my
face on it, I thought for a
second you were proud of me.
Jeffrey: For Chastain, it's just
the latest in a string of
high-wire, attention-getting,
often award-winning roles,
including an Oscar for best
actress last year in "The eyes
of Tammy Faye."
♪♪
and a recent screen actor's
guild award for the series,
"George and Tammy."
>> I know certainty freaks you
guys out, but it's 100.
Jeffrey: She's been a top
Hollywood star at least since
2012's "Zero dark thirty," but
her love of acting began on
stage growing up in northern
California.
In rehearsal here, she began to
find her Nora, a young wife and
mother kept in place by
society's strict rules of
behavior, who suddenly faces a
crisis that forces her to see
the world anew, and make
decisions that will change her
and others forever.
It's an old story, but says
Chastain, still plenty relevant.
>> She is playing within the
system to try to get what she
needs.
And that's Ibsen.
I mean, that's 1879.
He's incredible what he wrote
back then.
On paper, the obvious version is
this poor woman who's been
victimized.
But also I wanted to say, how is
she participating in it?
And how scary it is because we
all participate.
It's not even necessarily
associated to one gender.
Jeffrey: The original play has
been adapted by playwright Amy
Herzog, a co-writer on the
recent TV series, "Scenes from a
marriage."
>> If I don't leave right now,
I'm never going to.
Jeffrey: In which Chastain also
starred, alongside Oscar Isaac,
in a story of another troubled
marriage.
Herzog credits Ibsen as a major
influence on her own writing.
Here, she sought only to pare
down language and scenes,
matching the pared-down style of
the production, to bare the
essential quality of the
characters.
>> Sit down.
This could take a while.
>> I tried to dial up the ways
Nora was in control of the
situation.
So even if she's playing, you
know, innocent or playing a
victim or playing helpless, it
is still a choice she's making.
And she is still sort of and in
significant ways the director
and stage manager of the
proceedings, even if she gets
what she wants by playing a sort
of traditional woman.
Jeffrey: You saw that in the
original?
>> Absolutely.
Jeffrey: Because I'm not sure
that's the way everybody reads
it or has seen it in the past.
>> I think you're right.
But I don't think that's because
it's not there.
I think it's just the way the
play has been received as this
kind of feminist polemic has
flattened some of the subtleties
of the original.
Jeffrey: Chastain says she
wanted to avoid presenting a
polemic or Ted talk argument.
The unusual staging helped.
Even before the play starts, she
sits alone on stage, looking at
us.
You don't have the props, you're
often sitting in a chair.
Where does the energy come from?
>> It comes from the audience.
This is a whole different way of
working for me because in the
theater, you create, like, the
fourth wall, right?
And in some sense, I had fear of
the audience.
I was nervous, I felt like they
were an obstacle to what I
needed to do.
Jeffrey: This is you in the past
in the theater?
>> The past.
Even though I had started in the
theater and I'd done a lot of
it, I was aware of every cough,
I was aware of every single
person who opened up their food
and started eating, or their
phones were going off.
And I felt it all almost like an
assault.
And in this production, it's
been fascinating because I feel
the exact opposite.
Jeffrey: What is it that you get
from acting?
>> There's an immediate intimacy
with acting.
I find that in many cases,
even if we pretend we're not,
we're all sensitive beings that
are very tender and have a lot
of emotions.
And some people work very hard
to protect themselves and put up
this wall, right?
And we see that on the subway,
we see it, you know, talking to
people sometimes at a coffee
shop, how are you doing today?
Fine, thank you, how are you?
Fine, thank you.
But we're never really
connecting on an intimate level
with strangers.
And acting really changes that
for me.
I mean, I show up on a set,
could be someone I've never met
before, and there's an immediate
connection and openness, and
we're not allowed to be guarded
around each other.
Jeffrey: In addition to her
acting, Chastain is known for
her activism on behalf of women
in Hollywood on issues such as
pay equity and beyond.
When we met, her mind was very
much on the ongoing women-led
protests in Iran.
When you think about having all
this choice now about what you
do, what's important to you?
>> I'm drawn to characters that
see women as three-dimensional
human beings.
So, that could mean that they do
complicated things.
They can subvert the
stereotypical gender roles,
which is very interesting to me
because I find anything that
pushes the status quo of what a
woman is supposed to be or
supposed to do -- that, I think,
is a step forward.
Because we've always accepted
men as being able to do multiple
things.
And I think we need to see women
also as human beings.
So that's what I'm drawn to,
characters that treat women as
human beings.
Jeffrey: Simple as that.
>> Simple as that.
Actually, it sounds so easy,
doesn't it?
But, I think with some people,
it's still not super easy.
Jeffrey: Jessica Chastain
inhabits "A doll's house"
through June 10.
For the pbs "Newshour," I'm
Jeffrey brown on Broadway.