In the following review, Brustein talks about the contemporary remake of The Wild Duck. At the Arena Stage, Lucian Pintilie's version of Ibsen's The Wild Duck is a genuinely new look at the play, which pulls it out of canvas realism into a world of poetic metaphor and savage farce. The opening act in old Werle' s house is not altogether promising, but then it's a fearfully difficult piece of exposition (the second act of this five-act play is largely expository too). Pintilie tries to distract our attention from the two servants who provide Ibsen's background material by using strained devices behind a transparent Mylar mirror, including a sumptuous banquet and an anachronistic slide show of vacation photographs, conducted by Mrs. Sorby while the Chamberlains sing "Harvest Moon." (Even in the twenties, the setting of this.....
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