Loves of a She-devil

At Dallas Theater Center, Jenna Stern is another in a long line of sometimes-legendary performers who recognize in Hedda a unique dramatic challenge--a character who must do evil deeds for almost three hours without the actor allowing herself to slide into stridency and monotony. I admit that I couldn't look away from Stern. The suspended menace in her performance was real--her rigid posture and riveting but empty eyes reminded me of the warning that when a dog's neck goes stiff, the animal is about to bite. It's also an unsubtle performance that I enjoyed even while I didn't particularly believe Stern--from the affected lilt of her voice to her florid pauses before slinging a one-liner, there's nothing naturalistic about this incarnation of Hedda. The result is that the characters around her--with the exception of Christopher McCann as Judge Brack, a family friend of similar wicked mentality--come across as a spectacular pack of dupes. I'm not suggesting that anyone would predict the lengths to which Hedda would go to control a person's destiny, but Stern telegraphs her contempt for the others so assiduously that it unbalances the play's loose, conversational form. She plays to us rather than with her fellow actors, and as a result, they're given the task of ignoring the clues that stampede us sitting in the darkness.

Given Stern's crack timing and bracing, ice-brittle poses, it's not a fatal flaw. She just amplifies the black comic flourishes that Ibsen attached to Hedda Gabler. With all the talk of how the playwright fathered modern drama and made unprecedented explorations into the psychology and sexuality of women, the fact that he could be damned witty and even devilish often goes by the wayside. Dallas Theater Center's splendidly cruel production reminds us of that, if a bit broadly. No matter--it's much more entertaining to watch Hedda twirl her (invisible) mustache than wring her hands.