Happy birthday, Fedelma Cullen

When I was a kid, and my family was in Ireland, my mother took me and 2 of my siblings to a production of A Doll’s House at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin. Dad stayed home with Siobhan, who was 4. I was 13 years old. My dad warned us as we left, “She kills herself at the end …” (My dad got it mixed up with Hedda Gabler, which is hilarious since he knew everything. His intentions were good: he wanted us to be prepared.) As a result, we spent the entire play waiting for her to kill herself. Nora walked out in the final scene, slammed the door, and we cringed, waiting to hear a gun shot. The curtain fell. The cast came out for their bows. We were relieved but very rattled. We all still joke about “Oh, that was the time Dad thought Nora was Hedda…”

That production is still so vivid in my mind I remember specific blocking. I remember the costumes, the set, the reds/pinks/ivories of the interiors – like a real-life Valentine. A smothering suffocating claustrophobic Valentine.

Since I was only 13, I didn’t know the play at all. Since I knew nothing about it, I just soaked it up. The whole thing was a total revelation to me. It was a bit “beyond” me, as a Tween – and I am so thankful to the things I saw and read as a child that were slightly “beyond” me. They forced some growth spurts, realizations about the world, and human beings – and not always good realizations. A lot of these things were painful but I am grateful for them in retrospect. The long-ago Abbey production of Doll’s House – and specifically the actress who played Nora – represents one of those growth spurts.

What stays in my head, burned there forever, is the scene where Nora dances to distract Torvald from going to the mailbox …

To this day, my memory of the scene, and her – how she played it – stands as one of the greatest single pieces of acting I have ever seen in my life.

I don’t just chalk it up to being a child and therefore easily impressed. The scene was unBEARable to watch because her panic vibrated off the stage in gigantic waves, hitting me in the audience. I was pinned to my seat. I felt her urgency, I felt her objective. I knew why she danced like that, I understood the stakes. I felt how catastrophic it would be if he got the letter. I remember her costume: a blue dress, with elaborate black markings and black lace trimmings. She carried a black lace fan.

Nora’s objective: Do NOT let him go to the mailbox. DO WHATEVER YOU HAVE TO DO to keep him in the room.

The actress played this objective so powerfully and single-mindedly I wanted to jump up and scream at Torvald “DON’T GO TO THE MAILBOX!!” It’s one of the most stressful experiences I’ve ever had in the theatre.

We didn’t keep the program. There was no Internet. I didn’t know her name. Years passed. Decades of life occurred. But I never forgot what I saw that night at the Abbey. Every time I worked on a scene from A Doll’s House in acting classes I thought of her performance. A bar was set for me. Do THAT, or at least ATTEMPT to do what she did, otherwise you’re not doing the play. She cast such a long shadow in my memory. Once I knew a bit more about acting I understood. She became the epitome, for me, of so much, but most importantly of what it looks like when an actor plays an objective to the fullest.

Some years back, I thought: Let me find her damn name. I need her name, even though SHE will live in my memory forever because of her performance.

Her name was Fedelma Cullen. She died in 2003. She appeared in many productions at the Abbey. I was lucky enough to see that one. She changed my world.

She was one of the greatest actresses I’ve ever seen.