Ben
Brantley

October 5, 2001

She is absolutely terrified of scandal, she says; she will not have people talking about her. But now that Hedda Gabler is back in town, tongues are sure to start wagging more avidly than ever. How could they not, given that Ibsen’s most perplexing and beguiling heroine has been reincarnated with a clarity that positively stings by Kate Burton? Now here is a subject worth some serious gossip, a fascinator to command our absolute attention for a few hours while the world simmers ominously outside the Ambassador Theater, where ”Hedda Gabler” opened in a pistol shot of a production last night.

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April 22, 2014

Leave it to that perversely insightful Hedda Gabler to put her finger on what ails the new production of the play that bears her name. In the second act of this unhappy revival of Ibsen’s 1890 drama, which opened Sunday night at the American Airlines Theater, Hedda (Mary-Louise Parker) admits she possesses a talent for only one thing: “Feeling dead.” By that time no one is going to argue with her.

Associated Press

April 22, 2014

In director Ian Rickson’s nerve-jangling, melodramatic production of "Hedda Gabler," Henrik Ibsen’s unhappy heroine doesn’t walk. She paces with the deliberation of a caged animal.

Usa Today

April 22, 2014

One would assume that, given her paralyzing fear of scandal, the last thing Henrik Ibsen’s tortured 19th-century housewife would want is to make a spectacle of herself. But in the Roundabout Theatre Company’s new production of Hedda Gabler (** out of four), which opened Sunday at the American Airlines Theatre, that’s precisely what she does.

April 22, 2014

Mary-Louise Parker’s interpretation of "Hedda Gabler" was probably always going to be a little wacky, but in the Roundabout revival she’s the loopiest of a fairly off-kilter bunch. Using a disappointingly blunt new adaptation by Christopher Shinn, this is a production so doused in glum eccentricities that Ibsen’s terminally bored neurotic has already reached the apex of her caged desperation before a line of dialogue has even been spoken. And while there’s entertainment to be had from Parker’s curt sarcasm and nutty double-takes, too many perplexing choices make the great play unaffecting and the irrational actions of its self-destructive antiheroine unsurprising.

New York Daily News

April 22, 2014

April 22, 2014

Hedda Gabler” is sort of like “Gypsy.” Though one is an 1891 Ibsen drama and the other is a 1959 musical comedy, each is constantly revived because they operate as both monumental theater and star vehicles. In fact, the lead character of each is a similarly desperate, horrifying woman.