(RIVERSIDE, NJ) -- Masquerade Theatre presents Henrik Ibsen's A Doll House across two weekends from March 13-21, 2026. This groundbreaking play centers on Nora Helmer, a seemingly content wife and mother, whose seemingly perfect life is shattered by a secret she's kept from her husband, Torvald.
Nora, the wife of a banker, Thorwald, has a secret debt, incurred with good intentions and a forged signature. When her husband is promoted to bank manager, the threat of blackmail threatens to destroy his career and their family life together. As circumstances unravel, Nora realizes the truth of her situation: she accuses her husband and her father before him of having used her as a doll. In one of the most famous scenes ever written for the stage, Nora slams the door on her domestic life as wife and mother until she can learn to be herself. The marriage of Ibsen’s naturalistic style with Wilder’s knack for emotional nuance creates a modern, vigorous acting version of this revered classic drama.
The cast includes Colby Crawford (Krogstad), Mike Godwin (Dr. Rank), Allison Korn Grivas (Nora Helmer), Phyllis Josephson (Anne/Housemaid/Porter), Sara Viniar (Mrs. Linde), and Dan Wolfe (Torvald Helmer).
The production team includes Director: Jake Hufner; Stage Manager: Courtney Bundens; Artistic Director: Megan Knowlton Balne; Managing Director/Lights: Tommy Balne; Intimacy Coordinator: Sean McGarry; and Set Construction: Robert Schaeffer.
Performances take place Friday, March 13th at 8:00pm; Saturday, March 14th at 8:00pm; *Sunday, March 15th at 2:00pm; *Thursday, March 19th at 7:30pm; Friday, March 20th at 8:00pm; Saturday, March 21st at 2:00pm; and Saturday, March 21st at 8:00pm. Tickets are available for purchase online. The theater is located at 301 W Washington Street #100 in Riverside, New Jersey. * is "Pay What You Can" performances.
At age 23, Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906) became theatre director and resident playwright of the new National Theatre at Bergen, charged with creating a national drama. He directed the Norwegian Theatre in Kristiana from 1857 to 1863, when the theatre went bankrupt. He then set off on extended travels in Europe, beginning a self-imposed exile that would last until 1891.
In Italy, he wrote the troubling moral tragedy Brand (1866) and the buoyant Peer Gynt (1867). After the satire Pillars of Society (1877), he found his voice and an international audience with powerful studies of middle-class morality in A Doll's House (1879), Ghosts (1881), An Enemy of the People (1882), The Wild Duck (1884) and Rosmersholm (1886). His more symbolic plays, most of them written after his return to Norway in 1891, include Hedda Gabler (1890), The Master Builder (1892), Little Eyolf (1894) and When We Dead Awaken (1899).
Emphasizing character over plot, Ibsen addressed social problems such as political corruption and the changing role of women, as well as psychological conflicts stemming from frustrated love and destructive family relationships. He greatly influenced European theatre and is regarded as the founder of modern prose drama.
Masquerade Theatre seeks to unveil the roles, groups and beliefs that we hold fast and explore the humanity that lies beneath them. Art is one of the rare forms of human expression that is relatable to all people and permits us to share a common experience with a group of strangers in an audience. Theatre enables us to encounter circumstances and emotions through characters that move us and inspire us to think, react and learn.
Masquerade is dedicated to using theatre to enlighten, to help us bridge the issues that divide us and present pieces that will encourage us to remember one simple truth amongst the discord - our humanity.
