Henrik Ibsen’s claustrophobic classic still fresh and controversial.

A woman breaks the law borrowing money to save her husband from a killing frost. It is illegal for women to take a debt without a male guarantor – so she forges her dead father’s signature. He passed three days before, without her presence. She is proud of herself for her initiative. We meet her scrimping and saving to makes all repayments – but she has put herself in the power of a man who will do anything to maintain his self-respect. Soon her husband, a bank manager who values financial integrity above all, will unknowingly accuse her of poisoning her family through the deception. She considers suicide to avoid the damage to his reputation.

None of these people are evil. They are trapped within an evil system, their choices stoppered by tradition and bigotry and hatred of women.

A Doll’s House is at its heart a political play. Written in 19th century Norway and inspired by real events, it is one of Henrik Ibsen’s famous “problem plays”, confronting the audience directly in a realistic way with the tragic consequences of an ingrained but tolerated social wrong – in this case the...