The Lady from the Sea | |
---|---|
Written by | Henrik Ibsen |
Characters | Ellida Wangel Dr Wangel The Stranger Hilde Wangel Bolette Wangel Arnholm Lyngstrand Ballestad |
Date premiered | 12 February 1889 |
Place premiered | Kristiania and Weimar (simultaneous Norwegian and German premieres) |
Original language | Norwegian |
Subject | Marriage, freedom |
Genre | Tragedy |
Setting | A town by a fjord |
The Lady from the Sea (Norwegian: Fruen fra havet) is a play written in 1888 by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen inspired by the ballad Agnete og Havmanden . [1] The drama introduces the character of Hilde Wangel who is again portrayed in Ibsen's later play The Master Builder . The character portrayal of Hilde Wangel has been portrayed twice in contemporary film, most recently in the 2014 film titled A Master Builder .
This play is centred on a lady called Ellida. She is the daughter of a lighthouse-keeper, and grew up where the fjord met the open sea; she loves the sea. She is married to Doctor Wangel, a physician in a small fjord town in northern Norway. He has two daughters (Bolette and Hilde) by his previous wife, now deceased. He and Ellida have a son who died as a baby. Ellida is restless and troubled by a former romantic attachment. Wangel, fearing for Ellida’s mental health, has invited up Arnholm, Bolette’s former tutor, and a former suitor to Ellida, in the hope that he can help Ellida.
Some years earlier Ellida was deeply in love and engaged to a sailor, but because he murdered his captain he had to escape. Nevertheless, he asked her to wait for him to come and fetch her. She tried to break the engagement, but he had too great a hold over her. The sailor then returns all these years later to claim her. Ellida then has to choose between her former lover or her husband. Dr Wangel finally recognizes her freedom to choose since he understands that he has no other options. This goes in his favour as she then chooses him. The play ends with the sailor leaving and Ellida and Wangel deciding to take up their lives again together.
Henrik Johan Ibsen was a Norwegian playwright and theatre director. As one of the founders of modernism in theatre, Ibsen is often referred to as "the father of realism" and the most influential playwright of the 19th century, as well of one of the most influential playwrights in Western literature more generally. His major works include Brand, Peer Gynt, Emperor and Galilean, A Doll's House, Ghosts, An Enemy of the People, The Wild Duck, Rosmersholm, Hedda Gabler, The Master Builder, and When We Dead Awaken. Ibsen is the most frequently performed dramatist in the world after Shakespeare, and A Doll's House was the world's most performed play in 2006.
An Enemy of the People is an 1882 play by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen that delves into the conflict between personal integrity and societal norms. The play centers on Dr. Thomas Stockmann, who discovers a serious contamination issue in his town's new spas, endangering public health. His courageous decision to expose this truth brings severe backlash from local leaders, including his brother Peter Stockmann, who is a powerful political figure in the town.
The Master Builder is a play by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen.
Cornelia Froboess is a German actress and a teen idol of the 1950s and early 1960s. During that time, Froboess appeared in many West German and Austrian musical films, especially after the rock and roll wave had hit Germany. In those comedy films, she would often portray the typical Berliner Göre who craves independence from her strict parents.
Bartlett B. Sher is an American theatre director. The New York Times has described him as "one of the most original and exciting directors, not only in the American theater but also in the international world of opera". Sher has been nominated for nine Tony Awards, winning a Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical for the 2008 Broadway revival of South Pacific.
Madeleine Daly Potter is an American actress who has played roles in over 20 films and TV shows, including four productions directed by James Ivory. She has also appeared in numerous stage productions in the United States and United Kingdom. She made her New York stage debut in Loves Labor's Lost at The Shakespeare Center, produced by the Riverside Shakespeare Company in 1981.
Little Eyolf is an 1894 play by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen. The play was first performed in Norwegian on December 3, 1894, at a 9 a.m. matinee performance in the Haymarket Theatre in London.
Laila Elin Goody is a Norwegian actress. She was born to an English father who worked in the oil industry and a Norwegian mother. She was born in Stavanger and grew up in Rosendal, Hordaland between the ages of two to ten, before returning to Stavanger. Here she attended Stavanger Katedralskole. After graduating from the Norwegian National Academy of Theatre in 1994, she began working at the National Theatre. After nine years at this theatre she decided to take a break, and in 2003 she moved on to do guest performances at Trøndelag Teater and Centralteatret.
Andrea Bræin Hovig is a Norwegian actress.
Andrine Sæther is a Norwegian actress.
Amy McAllister is an Irish actress, most notable for her role as Mary in the BBC drama Call the Midwife. She appeared in Breeders alongside Martin Freeman for Sky One and in A Discovery of Witches which also stars Matthew Goode and Alex Kingston. Other credits include the BAFTA winning BBC/Merman comedy-drama There She Goes with Jessica Hynes and David Tennant, Victorian detective drama Miss Scarlet and the Duke for UKTV and PBS, Witless for BBC Three and the Stephen Frears film Philomena, which stars Steve Coogan and Judi Dench.
Anna Magdalene Thoresen, née Kragh was a Danish-born Norwegian poet, novelist, short story writer and playwright. She is said to have inspired a number of other writers to model characters after her. Her stepdaughter, Suzannah Ibsen, was married to Henrik Ibsen. A selection of her letters has been published as Breve fra Magdalene Thoresen 1855-1901.
The Théâtre de Paris is a theatre located at 15, rue Blanche in the 9th arrondissement of Paris. It includes a second smaller venue, the Petit Théâtre de Paris.
The Lady from the Sea is a 1961 drama one-off presented on Australian broadcaster ABC. An adaptation of 1888 play by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, it went for 75 minutes and was telecast live on 4 October 1961 in Melbourne, and was recorded for showing in Sydney.
"The Lady from the Sea" is a 1953 episode of Sunday Night Theatre that is significant as one of the earliest extant examples of British television drama, along with an earlier episode of the series titled "It is Midnight, Doctor Schweitzer" and the first two episodes of The Quatermass Experiment. An adaptation of the 1888 play by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, it was performed twice, first on 10 May 1953 and again on the 14th. One of these live transmissions was recorded using the then-experimental telerecording process.
A Master Builder is a 2013 film directed by Jonathan Demme, based on Henrik Ibsen's 1892 play The Master Builder. The film was released in the United States in June 2014 and stars Wallace Shawn, Julie Hagerty, Lisa Joyce and André Gregory. The film is a production of the Ibsen play dealing with the relationship between an aging architect and a younger woman. The play originally premiered in 1893.
Betty Mathilde Hennings née Schnell (1850–1939) was a Danish actress who entered the Royal Danish Theatre as a ballet dancer but in 1870 turned to acting, first performing in Molière's The School for Wives. She later became known for her roles in the plays of Henrik Ibsen, especially as Nora in A Doll's House.
Maria Nikolayevna Krasovskaya-Kalitinskaya was a Russian actress, theatre director and reader in drama, better known under her stage name Maria Germanova (Германова).
Sara Louise Vickers is a Scottish theatre, television and film actress best known for playing Joan Thursday in the British television detective drama series Endeavour.
Knut Jacobsen was a Norwegian actor and costume designer.