by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen.
Hedda is the spoiled, destitute daughter of General Gabler and she is bored. Her marriage – undertaken out of pure calculation to secure her position in society – doesn’t fulfill her. Her husband Tesman doesn’t mean anything to her. The ambitious culture scientist spent their honeymoon working on his first book which should bring him a position as a professor at the university. But Hedda longs for excitement and passion.
As her former lover Ejlert Løvborg returns to the city the situation gets tense. For Tesman he is not only a rival in love but more so in their common profession. Løvborg has spent the past years on the countryside working as a private teacher for the Elvsted family. There he did not just overcome his alcohol addiction, he wrote a much respected book with the active support of Thea Elvsted, making him also a candidate for the professor position.
Hedda burns with jealousy, but soon she gets a taste for taking matters into her own hands. She instigates a deadly game and pushes Løvborg back into addiction. He ends up gambling away his reputation, his career, his existence. Hedda enforces his desperation until suicide becomes his last escape. Hedda becomes a puppet master of her surrounding. She realises too late that she is loosing control…
Schauspielhaus Salzburg
Premiere on 24th of November 2016
Staging: Charlotte Koppenhöfer
Stage & Costume Design: Julie Weideli
Check out what Dreh Punkt Kultur had to say about our production!
photo credits: Jan Friese