Susan Agin and the Queensborough Performing Arts Center will present Henrik Ibsen’s classic play, A DOLL’s HOUSE for an invited audience in April as part of an arts and education program.

Ibsen’s play still projects a substantial message – one of female empowerment, abuse, misogyny, and – as we look at it through the lens of post-Trump America – high crime and corruption.

Ms. Agin brought Jay Michaels aboard to direct the production. Michaels, a professor of communications and theater are various universities, is also known for his direction and production of much of Shakespeare’s canon felt right at home with Ibsen: “the play cause controversy when it first opened in the late 19th Century. It brought-to-light issues that many were not ready to deal with,” he said. Vincent Ticali – who appeared as Dr. Rank, a character of a very distinct time period, interjected about the classics “I believe it is very important to share classics, in every genre (theatre, literature, music, film, etc), with a young audience. Everything that has come before, in a way, contributes to what will be created now and in the future. I think it’s so valuable, through the exploration of the “classics,” for young people to see that, while it’s obvious that many things have changed over the years, there are still so many themes that resonate with us all and that bind us as human beings.”

Ticali, whose work can be seen on film, television, stage (although not as much as he’d like to) is also a musician, voice actor, and commercial print model. About his role in thsi play, “I especially enjoy being given the opportunity to do things that are out of my “comfort zone.”

Ticali elaborated on Ibsen’s work:

“A Doll’s House” is certainly a groundbreaking play, for it’s time. While I don’t think it can still be labeled as “groundbreaking” for modern times, it certainly can be called prescient. It foresees what has come to pass and the ongoing process of attaining equal opportunity for women and for people of all social and economic classes. Dr. Rank is an interesting character in that, even in the time in which this classic play is set, he represents the “old guard” – the patriarchy clinging to the ways and norms of his class/gender-based society. He does not take Nora, or any woman, seriously – except perhaps as a possible sexual conquest. He is neither hero nor villain. He is simply a product of his age. Men of this kind certainly still exist today and, interestingly, because the values of the world have shifted all around them, the definitely appear more as villains in modern times.”

After this, Vinnie continues work on an ongoing feature film project and shooting the first episode of an independent television series.