(2 of 2)
In modern parlance, "Look out for No. 1." Which, except for an affecting reunion with his dying mother (Gloria Foster), is exactly how Peer conducts his life.
In a sense, Part I forecloses an epoch. Ibsen encompasses the dying out of old legends and old gods, the anachronism of the early 19th century Byronic romantic hero and the ushering in of urban industrial society with its hard-nosed pragmatism.
Presciently modern, Ibsen foresaw that collectivized man would make egocentric quests for identity and searches for self. Peer's quest for self-definition becomes a tale of tepid damnation. The suave, cynical Peer of Part II (played with acute perceptivity by Gerry Bamman) defines himself by what he does and not by what he is. And what he does is always tainted by easy accommodation and the habit of incessant compromise. He moves from trading slaves out of Charleston, S.C., and shipping pagan idols to China to reigning as a prophet in the Moroccan desert, finally ending up crowned "the Emperor of Self in a Cairo mad house, with a wreath of straw.
Back in Norway, old and ailing, Peer meets a mysterious stranger in a black business suit. This is the Button Molder (Walter Atamaniuk), who tells him he is to be melted down as "damaged goods" and recast with "the mass of humanity." Essentially, the Button Molder likens Peer to those whom Dante consigned to Limbo: "That caitiff choir of the angels, who were not rebellious, nor were faithful to God; but were for themselves." Peer flees to the mountain hut where Solveig, ever faithful and now blind, cradles him in her arms. But neither Ciulei's direction nor Fiorenzo Carpi's astringent dissonant music makes this a redemptive moment. It is a requiem for a lost soul.
The audacity of this Guthrie offering brings honor to the U.S. theater. It also reminds us of what an intrepid culture hero Henrik Ibsen was. He strove mightily against the confines of a narrow provincial society to free the spirit and light up the mind. All of his plays are the sounds of chains snapping.
— By T.E. Kalem