Reimagination of Power in Mabou Mines' Dollhouse

In Mabou Mines’ experimental interpretation of Ibsen’s A Doll’s House, perhaps the most immediately obvious of the many radical choices is the stature of the actors. All of the men in this production are under five feet, and all of the women are over six feet, with the exception of the Helmer daughter, Emmy, who is played by a thirty-seven-inch-tall primordial dwarf. Another notable choice is the use of nudity at different points of the performance, as many of the characters appear in various stages of undress during the show. Both the choice in height and in costume attempt to subvert traditional views of the source of power. Throughout the majority of the show, the men, despite their diminutive stature, hold power over the women, and both female and male characters use their own nudity as a tool for intimidating those around them. Whereas society traditionally relates shortness with weakness, and nakedness with shame and babyhood, Mabou Mines’ Dollhouse seeks to relay the point that it is not what you have, but how you use it, that gives you power.

The male characters in Mabou Mines’ Dollhouse use their short stature to their own advantage, creating a world in which women are forced to be subservient. The set is a man’s world: all of the set-pieces and props are built to their size, and the women literally do not fit in. In her New York Times review of the show, Margo Jefferson, explaining choice of height, said that “our bodies instinctively crave order, that from infancy on we try to control the world's scale and proportions. That's why the dwarfs and giants of folk tales are powerful.” The men show their power by creating a world expressly for people of their size, and by forcing the women to live in a world where they are uncomfortable. The women in the play are forced to shrink themselves below the men; in most of the scenes in which both female and male characters appear, the women kneel, lie, or sit in order to be below the men.

The men express physical dominance throughout the play. They take advantage of the women’s subservient postures and, at many points of the production, mount and/or climb on top of women. Though the women, because of their large size, are clearly not pinned to the ground by the men, they act as if they are unable to move. Even when the women do respond, the men use it to their advantage. At one point, Nora crawls between Torvald’s legs, lifting him onto her back so that his feet cannot reach the ground. And yet even though Nora is nearly two feet taller than Torvald, even though she is the one moving, Torvald takes control of his wife as if she is a horse, and controls where she goes. Until the end of the play, every move the men make is a show of dominance. In Jefferson’s words, “They wear perfectly cut Victorian jackets…they swagger through the doorway, smoke cigars and slap one another on the back. They are like toy soldiers.” Just like soldiers, every movement shows purpose and dominance. Their strutting and their physical and sexual mistreatment of women show the most extreme of the domineering quality of maleness. It is perhaps because of their height that they are so controlling, and so eager to abuse those around them. At every moment their power is challenged, and so they use the size of their homes and their physical behavior to keep the women from rising up to their full height.

Nudity is also used as a show of physical power. In the masquerade scene, Krogstad is shirtless, clad only in the bottom half of an obscene goat costume. In the masquerade scene, he takes advantage of everyone, dominating them. Later in the play, Torvald also uses his own nakedness to show control over Nora. For a large amount of their conflict scene, he, half-nude, nearly rapes her, and as a finale to his show of power, he drops his underclothes and stands naked, arms raised, in front of Nora, who kneels in front of him. Despite his height, his body is well built, and in that moment, there is no question of who is in control.

However, at the end of the play, the tides turn. During the opera scene, Nora, whose clothing has been disappearing slowly throughout the play, drops her last items of clothing. In a balcony overlooking the now-robed Torvald, she stands completely naked and completely still. Her hair, the last of her once-elaborate costume, has disappeared. She is no longer putting on a show for Torvald, flittering around in elaborate frills for his benefit. Her voice has dropped, and she stands at her full impressive height. The world of the play is still a caricature, but it is no longer a doll’s house. It has become a giant’s world, and it is Torvald’s turn to adapt.


Works cited:
Ibsen, Henrik. Adaptation by Breuer, Lee and Mitchell, Maude. Mabou Mines
Dollhouse. New York, St. Ann’s Warehouse,
New York, 24 February 2009
Jefferson, Margo. “THEATER REVIEW; Fun-House Proportions Turn Dominance
Upside Down.” New York Times, 24 November 2003.