How Hedda achieves her goal is the subject of DaCosta’s bacchanal of carousing and carnage, which follows the hostess as she sets an obstacle course of mind games and then observes her cohorts — mostly the female ones — edge their ways through it. Trailing Hedda across the gilded ballroom and mahogany library, into corners and up and down the carpeted staircase, DaCosta wants to survey how clever women cope with being a captive of their circumstances. What gets suppressed, and what is set loose?