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Henrik Ibsen Translated by David Edgar Directed by Andrei Belgrader Featuring John Turturro

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Master Builder By Henrik Ibsen Translated by David Edgar Directed by Andrei Belgrader Featuring John Turturro Study Guide written by Nicole Kempskie BAM PETER JAY SHARP BUILDING 30 LAFAYETTE AVE. BROOKLYN, NY 11217 TABLE OF CONTENTS DEAR EDUcator HOW TO USE Welcome to the study guide for Henrik THIS GUIDE Page 2: Numbers Tell A Story Ibsen’s classic play The Master Builder, Arts experiences resonate most strongly Page 4: Sustainability directed by Andrei Belgrader and starring for students when themes and ideas award-winning actor John Turturro (Do Page 6: Waste Away from the film can be aligned to your the Right Thing, Barton Fink, Quiz Show). current curriculum. This resource guide Page 8: The Social Issue Documentary At this performance your students will has been created to provide you with Page 10: Classroom Connections & have the opportunity to see one of the background information to help you Norwegian playwright’s most personal Resources prepare your students to see The Master and significant works. Written in 1892, Page 11: Currculum Connections Builder. Depending on your needs, you The Master Builder tells the story of may choose to use certain sections that Halvard Solness, a middle-aged architect directly pertain to your curriculum, or use who has risen to the top of his field, but the guide in its entirety. We encourage is overcome with guilt and doubt over the you to photocopy and share pages of this way he’s achieved his success. When a guide with your students. In addition, mysterious young woman appears at the at the end of this guide you will find Solness house and reignites Halvard’s suggested classroom activities, pre and passion, drive, and vitality, his egoism post-visit screening questions, and links leads him to risk it all to manifest her to resources that you can explore and fantasy. With its blend of realist and expressionist elements, psychologically implement before or after seeing the film. complex characters, and resonant themes, The Master Builder provides a compelling The overall goals of this guide are to: entry point into the work of a playwright considered by many to be the father of Connect to your curriculum modern drama. with standards-based information and activities; Reinforce and encourage your students to exercise their critical and analytical thinking skills; and, YOUR VISIT TO BAM provide you and your students with the necessary tools to have The BAM program includes this study an engaging, educational, and guide; a pre-performance workshop in inspiring experience at BAM. your classroom led by a BAM teaching artist; and the performance on Thursday, May 30 (2 hrs 30 min). The performance will be immediately followed by a post-show discussion (30— 40 minutes). Please arrange for your students to stay and participate in this unique question-and-answer session. Introduction2 Introduction3 HENRIK IBSEN “He who wishes to understand me, Entry into the Theater A Shift in Style must know Norway. The magnificent, but severe, natural environment sur- In 1849, Ibsen wrote his first play, Cata- In the late 1870s and early 1880s, Ibsen rounding people up there in the north, line, in verse, which would not be pro- started to shift the way he wrote. He the lonely, secluded life—the farms are duced until years later. The following year, began to integrate elements from the realist miles apart—forces them to be uncon- he moved to Christiania (now Oslo) to at- movement that was occurring in literature cerned with others, to keep to their own. tend the university, but failed his entrance and art. His new approach to writing and That is why they become introspective exams. Nevertheless, he continued to write subject matter was centered around the and serious, they brood and doubt—and and completed his second play, The War- relevant social problems of the day, and he they often lose faith. At home every other rior’s Bow. began artfully crafting nuanced characters person is a philosopher! There, the long, with complex psychological profiles that dark, winters come with their thick fogs In 1851, he moved to Bergen to join the extended beyond the stage. This was a enveloping the houses—oh, how they newly formed National Theatre. As part significant departure from the “well-made” long for the sun!” of the company he was required to write melodramas that filled the stages up to this —Henrik Ibsen and stage a play each year and assist in a point. These new prose plays written by number of capacities (as a stage manager, Ibsen (A Doll’s House, Ghosts, An Enemy costume designer, director, and business of the People, and The Wild Duck) marked The Early Years manager) for the other shows produced by the beginning of modern drama and Henrik Ibsen was born on March 20, the theater. He worked with the company ushered in a new style of theater called 1828, in Skien, Norway. His father, Knud, for seven years and wrote plays in the realism. was a wealthy merchant who provided melodramatic style popular at the time. a comfortable life for Ibsen, his mother While his plays were not well received By the time Ibsen wrote The Master Marichen, and his sister. In 1834, Knud’s by audiences, this full immersion in all Builder in 1892, he had returned to business failed and he lost his store. The aspects of the theater helped him fine-tune Norway and was considered to be one of family was thrust into poverty and Ibsen his writing skills. the world’s leading dramatists. His last was eventually forced to leave school at plays, among them The Master Builder, the age fifteen and take a job as a phar- In 1857, Ibsen became the artistic director integrated elements of expressionism. After macist’s assistant. During this time, Ibsen of Christiana’s Norwegian Theater. Soon suffering from a series of strokes, Ibsen immersed himself in literature and the arts, after, he met his wife Suzannah Thoresen died on May 23, 1906, in Oslo, Norway. drawing, reading, and writing poetry to es- and they married. They had a son, Sigurd, cape the humiliation his family suffered be- born in 1859. The Norwegian Theater cause of their financial debt. The wounds went bankrupt in 1862, and in 1864, left from this experience would emerge in suffering from emotional and mental many of his plays, such as A Doll’s House stress, Ibsen left Norway on a travel grant and John Gabriel Borkman. to Rome. He stayed abroad for the next 27 years and would write many of his most In 1846, Ibsen became involved with a celebrated works far from his homeland. servant ten years older than himself and fathered a child with her. While they did not marry, Ibsen supported the child for fourteen years, and the experience of fathering an illegitimate child would also surface in many of his plays later in life. Background4 SELECTED WORKS VERSE Plays Brand (1866) Peer Gynt (1867) PROSE Plays A Doll’s House (1871) The Pillars of Society (1877) Ghosts (1881) An Enemy of the People (1882) The Wild Duck (1884) Rosmersholm (1886) The Lady from the Sea (1888) Hedda Gabler (1891) The Master Builder (1892) Little Eyolf (1894) John Gabriel Borkman (1896) When We Dead Awaken (1899) INTRODUCTORY ACTIVITY As Ibsen says in the quote above, in order to understand him, one must understand Norway. Before your visit, have students write a short research report or present a short verbal report on one of the topics below, as it applies to Norway in the late 19th-century. Geography Politics Class Structure Literature Music Art Religion Background5 THE PLAY CHARACTERS Knut Brovik A former architect who now works as an assistant to Solness; his health is failing, and it deteriorates rapidly throughout the course of the play. Ragnar Brovik The son of Knut who works as a draftsman to Solness; he has talent as an architect, but is afraid to stand up to Solness. Kaja Fosli Ragnar’s fiancé and Solness’s bookkeeper; she has fallen deeply in love with Solness. Dr. Herdal The family doctor and advisor. Aline Solness Solness’s wife; she is mentally and emo- tionally distraught over the death of her two sons and the fire that destroyed her parents’ home. Halvard Solness The master builder; a top architect who is driven, ambitious, and used to controlling those around him. Hilde Wangel A mysterious young woman who comes to stay with Solness and his wife; she is vibrant and passionate and reignites Sol- ness’s drive for success and pleasure. Background6 SYNOPSIS ACT 1 ACT 2 The play begins in the workroom of Later that day, Aline and Solness discuss master builder Halvard Solness, where Aline’s pervasive depression. He assures his assistant, Knut Brovik, Knut’s son her that she will be happier when they Ragnar, and Ragnar’s fiancé Kaja are move into the new house that he has busy at work. It appears that Knut is very built to replace her parents’ home, which ill and most likely doesn’t have much has been lost in a fire. Aline refuses to longer to live. Knowing this, Knut asks believe that she will ever recover from the Solness to recognize his son’s abilities fire. When he is alone with Hilde, Solness and let him head a new project that he confides in her and explains that after the has been designing drafts for. Solness fire, Aline was so despondent that she refuses and is angered because Ragnar was unable to nurse their twin sons, and has secretly been drafting blueprints and they died as a result.
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