REVIEW: ‘Ghosts,’ a rarely produced Ibsen classic, receives first-rate revival at LCT
Photo: Ghosts stars Lily Rabe and Levon Hawke. Photo courtesy of Jeremy Daniel / Provided by official site.
NEW YORK — Odds are that if a theater company is going to revive an Henrik Ibsen play, the choice will be A Doll’s House or perhaps An Enemy of the People, both of which have recently been featured on Broadway. Maybe The Master Builder or Hedda Gabler are on the shortlist as well. Ghosts, one of the playwright’s best, is a rarer property that hasn’t made the circuit like the other works. That’s a shame because this exquisite show packs an emotional punch, and if the interpreters of these complex characters are first-rate, then the night at the theater proves quite memorable indeed.
Thankfully, Lincoln Center Theater is giving New York City audiences the chance to experience this transfixing drama at its off-Broadway home, the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater. Performances for the extended run continue through Saturday, April 26.
Much of the success of this version of Ghosts should be credited to Mark O’Rowe, who has adapted the original play into a more digestible, yet no less riveting one-act that runs approximately 100 minutes. Jack O’Brien, one of theater’s greats, is in the director’s chair, and he has a talented cast to bring energy and life to these wan, melancholic characters.
Lily Rabe plays Helena Alving, who welcomes her son, Oswald (Levon Hawke), for a respite at the family home. He is suffering from an unnamed illness, and he physically and emotionally needs to restore his life and spend time with loved ones. But things get complicated at the Alving house. Pastor Manders (Billy Crudup) speaks of sin and morality, in a very uninvited manner, showing up to castigate and share secrets of the family. There’s also Regina (Ella Beatty), a housemaid who falls under Oswald’s eye. Rounding out the cast is Hamish Linklater as Engstrand, Regina’s father and a man who feels uncomfortable in the tony surroundings of the Alving household.
Like so many of Ibsen’s plays, there are fascinating conversations and ponderings about issues that involve class, religion, parenting and inheritance. There are more than a few shocking revelations as the play proceeds toward a dramatic flourish that feels both surprising yet inevitable.
Rabe is particularly powerful as Helena. Her attempts to hold the family together are constantly foiled, and she seems unable to escape the dark shadow of her former husband, Oswald’s father. Intergenerational traumas come into play, and characters start to ask whether the sins of the previous generation are visited upon the younger fleet.
Crudup’s pastor role is an interesting one. No doubt this “outsider” character was inserted into the plot as a means for Ibsen to comment upon religion and the times in which he wrote the play. What the pastor has to say still feels resonant in 2025, with progress being abated by old-fashioned, stifling rules and expectations. Ibsen was very much an anti-moralist.
Beatty and Hawke both hold their own as a relationship between their characters begins to develop. They are seemingly some type of Romeo and Juliet, with their divide not warring families but class divisions. Can Regina ever fall for Oswald when he comes from such money and prestige, and she answers Helena’s every beck and call?
The production proves nail-bitingly intense and overwhelming with emotion. The final 15 minutes are some of the best theater in New York City. A few directorial flourishes work less well — it’s still a head-scratcher why the actors carry scripts in the first and final scenes — but these choices never distract from the power of the proceedings. Ghosts is definitely an Ibsen masterpiece, and this LCT production proves that the show should be on stages just as frequently as those dolls and enemies of the people.
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Ghosts, written by Henrik Ibsen with a new version by Mark O’Rowe, is directed by Jack O’Brien and stars Lily Rabe, Hamish Linklater, Ella Beatty, Billy Crudup and Levon Hawke. Running time: 100 minutes with no intermission. Runs through Saturday, April 26, at the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater at Lincoln Center Theater. Click here for more information and tickets.
