PRESS: A DOLL’S HOUSE, PART 2 at The Baxter in April, with Bianca Amato and Zane Meas

Fahiem Stellenboom

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The highly anticipated Tony award-winning, A DOLL’S HOUSE, PART 2, with Bianca Amato and Zane Meas, comes to The Baxter Studio from 16 April to 10 May.

Photo by Brett Rubin.

The critically acclaimed Tony award-winning play A DOLL’S HOUSE, PART 2 by Lucas Hnath, after successful runs on Broadway and at the Donmar Warehouse in London, comes to the Baxter Studio in April 2025, starring Bianca Amato and Zane Meas.

Presented by The Quickening Theatre Company, the smart, funny, freshly contemporary response to Ibsen’s classic is directed by Barbara Rubin and runs from 16 April to 10 May 205, at 8pm, with Saturday matinees at 3pm.

Bianca Amato, perhaps best known as Philippa de Villiers in Isidingo, returns to the South African stage to play Nora, after garnering a wealth of experience and recognition in New York City both On and Off Broadway. SA's beloved star of stage and screen Zane Meas plays Torvald. Seasoned NY-based Barbara Rubin ( Kindertransport, How I learnt to Drive) returns to her home country to take the helm as director. The play also features stage veteran Charlotte Butler (Isidingo, Home Affairs, Green Man Flashing) and Simone Neethling (Arendsvlei, Romeo and Juliet, Maynardville 2024). Set Design is by Greg King (My Fair Lady, The Beauty Queen of Leenane) and Costume Design is by Maritha Visagie ( My Fair Lady, Tosca).

Lucas Hnath’s plays include Dana H., The Thin Place, Hillary and Clinton, Red Speedo, The Christians, Isaac’s Eye, and Death Tax. He has been produced on Broadway at the John Golden and Lyceum Theatres; Off-Broadway at New York Theatre Workshop, The Vineyard, Playwrights Horizons, Soho Rep, and Ensemble Studio Theatre. Awards: Whiting Award, Guggenheim Fellowship, Kesselring Prize, Outer Critics Circle Award for Best New Play, Obie Award for Playwriting, Steinberg Playwright Award, Windham-Campbell Literary Prize, Lucille Lortel Award, and a Tony Nomination for Best Play.

Photo by Brett Rubin.

The New York Times declared A DOLL’S HOUSE, PART 2 to be “Smart, funny and utterly engrossing”. Time Out New York gave it five stars and said “F… keeps you hanging on each turn of argument and twist of knife. It’s dynamite.”  Hollywood Reporter gave equal praise, saying “While gender politics has seldom been this amusing, there’s also genuine poignancy… Hnath shows a superb knack for balancing humor with serious issues.”  The Guardian called it  “fast, vibrant, salty, modern.” Time Out London described it as, “Clever, taut, funny”, and London Theatre found it “Playful, provocative and richly intelligent”.

“There is no need to have seen the original A Doll’s House to delight in and relate to this play,” explains Amato. “It stands entirely on its own and promises to ignite much recognition, laughter and fierce debate for us all.”

In the iconic climax of Henrik Ibsen’s original play, written in 1879,  Nora Helmer shockingly rejects the suffocating confines of her marriage, and walks out the door, leaving behind her husband and children. We know only that she is desperate for her own becoming,  to find her own truth.  Now, fifteen years later, she is back, knocking on that same door, because she needs something.  What has her life been like on the outside, untethered to tradition, family and convention? What does she want?  What ensues is an expansion and a reckoning for everyone in the Helmer household.  We relate to each character’s flawed but deeply human take on relationships and responsibility. This thought-provoking and nuanced play debating the pros and cons of marriage is both moving and immensely entertaining - a sharp, often explosively hilarious investigation into societal expectations of love and tradition.

Booking for the highly anticipateA DOLL’S HOUSE, PART 2, at the Baxter Studio, from 16 April to 10 May 2025, is through Webtickets online or at Pick n Pay stores.