“It’s thorny and it’s delicious,” says the director Jack O’Brien of Ghosts. Written in 1881 by the Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, the play is a feast of taboos that remain as unmentionable as ever, from incest to venereal disease to euthanasia. The story follows Oswald, who returns to his home in Norway after several years in Paris and harbors a secret. Meanwhile, his mother, Helena, is preparing to open an orphanage named after her late husband, Captain Alving, despite knowing of his years of infidelity. Other characters—Pastor Manders, the housemaid Regina, and her father, Engstrand—conceal their own secrets. “It’s one of the most remarkable pieces in dramatic literature,” says O’Brien, who directs a cast that includes Lily Rabe, Billy Crudup, and Levon Hawke, the son of Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman. The production is using a new adaptation written by the Irish playwright Mark O’Rowe. —Jeanne Malle