Welcome
John William Tuohy lives in Washington DC
*** OPPORTUNITIES FOR PLAYWRIGHTS ***
*** OPPORTUNITIES FOR PLAYWRIGHTS ***
Pegasus PlayLab is a new play festival at the University of Central Florida dedicated to developing new works by MFA Playwriting candidates or emerging playwrights. We are seeking four full-length plays, including devised works and Theatre for Young Audiences (TYA) pieces, which we will rehearse for two weeks in collaboration with the playwright and subsequently present as workshop productions. There is a possibility that one play will be fully mounted into a production.
***
This year we are asking playwrights to submit a new 10-minute play inspired by the characters in Shakespeare’s pastoral comedy As You Like It.
PROMPT: After the Curtain: Where are they now?
At the end of As You Like It four couples marry (Rosiland & Orlando, Celia & Oliver, Phoebe & Silvius, Audrey & Touchstone), Jacques is off to pursue a religious life of contemplation, and Duke Senior, his crown newly restored to him, plans to return from exile and create a new court.
***
The Sauk, located in Jonesville, Michigan, is seeking scripts to consider for production as part of SAUK SHORTS 2023.
Scripts may be original works or published works that you would like us to consider. Scripts should have a performance time no longer than 15 minutes.
*** FOR MORE INFORMATION about these and other opportunities see the web site at https://www.nycplaywrights.org ***
*** CLYDE'S ***
Theaters around America appear to be staging fewer shows than they were before the pandemic, but a lot of the work they are doing is by Lynn Nottage.
An annual survey by American Theater magazine, conducted this year for the first time since the start of the pandemic, found that Nottage’s sandwich shop comedy, “Clyde’s,” will be the most-produced play in the country this season, with at least 11 productions. The survey also found that there were 24 productions of Nottage plays planned this season, which ties her with the perennial regional theater favorite Lauren Gunderson for the title of most-produced playwright in America.
“Clyde’s,” which had a well-reviewed Broadway production starring Uzo Aduba that opened late last year, is peopled by characters who previously served time in prison, and its mix of laughter and social commentary, plus Nottage’s stature as a two-time Pulitzer winner, apparently appealed to those who program theater seasons. Among those staging the play are the Arden Theater Company in Philadelphia, the Arkansas Repertory Theater, Berkeley Repertory Theater, Center Theater Group in Los Angeles and TheaterWorks Hartford.
“‘Clyde’s’ just hit the sweet spot — it has a multiracial cast, it addresses issues of incarceration and racial tension, it’s a comedy, and it’s really smart, and it’s by a Pulitzer winner,” said Rob Weinert-Kendt, the editor in chief of American Theater and an occasional contributor to The New York Times. “It’s a comedy, but it’s not turning away from the world.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/23/theater/most-popular-plays-playwrights.html
***
Clyde's: Turning Art Into Justicd
Second Stage Theater
A conversation between playwright Lynn Nottage, director Kate Whoriskey, and Ford Foundation president Darren Walker
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRYT6djNjv4
***
Nottage describes Clyde's as magical realism, and says it's set both in the kitchen of a sandwich shop and a liminal space. All the play's characters are formerly incarcerated, including the shop's owner, who's kind of the boss from hell.
Uzo Aduba, best known for her Emmy Award-winning role of Suzanne "Crazy Eyes" Warren in Orange Is the New Black, plays the devilish Clyde. She admires Nottage's choice of topics: "She has done the very hard thing of giving space to faces, voices and stories that are often forgotten."
When Nottage went to Reading, Penn., to research Sweat, her play about struggling blue collar workers, she also spoke with many people who were trying to resurrect their lives after leaving prison. So, while the characters in Clyde's work a dreary, repetitive job, they dream of a better future... and a better sandwich.
More...
https://www.npr.org/2022/01/14/1072902297/two-time-pulitzer-winner-lynn-nottage-turns-a-triple-play-in-new-york-city
***
What melts away as you get to know the characters are the monumental stigmas attached to jail time. Donovan’s Jason is inked to the max with prison tats, some of them racist symbols, but the story behind them reveals something unexpected. Letitia, here called Tish, in Young’s smashingly vibrant turn, is all adolescent energy and adult anxiety, the latter brought on as a single mother caring for a sick child. Salazar’s hyper Rafael needs an emotional home for his nurturing instincts, as an alternative to his weakness for drugs.
Aduba, in one of the best roles of her career, swans in and out of the kitchen, her Clyde never letting the employees forget her power over them. She’s their new matron, and they have traded one kind of prison for another. Like the sandwiches they fuss over, though, Nottage wants us to know that their fates remain in their own hands. The fun of “Clyde’s” is waiting to see which way that realization cuts.
More...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/theater_dance/clydes-nottage-broadway-play/2021/11/23/608fe630-4c69-11ec-b73b-a00d6e559a6e_story.html
***
Often, the sessions lead to bouts of confession—all the employees give up the goods on why they did time, even, eventually, Jason. This is supposed to deepen the bonds among them, and, perhaps, to offer a well of complexity not often granted to working-class people chewed up by the system and given a harsh set of choices: eat shit, starve, or go back in. But the life stories come between slapstick riffs on sandwich-making and kitchen etiquette—a bunch of well-performed gags—and as a result the play has trouble finding its tone. It’s hard to figure out how seriously to take the putatively tough moments in “Clyde’s,” or what to do with the biographies we’re offered. (Clyde’s own answer to anybody else’s suffering is to dismiss it. “I don’t do pity,” she says.) The lighting, by Christopher Akerlind, tries to indicate emotion—when Montrellous is rhapsodizing, he gets a fuchsia glow—but nothing that any character says steers the play in a new direction. Sad tales are divots for us to navigate between laughs.
Much of the problem lies with Clyde herself. In an early private moment, Clyde and Montrellous—who have a history that remains shrouded throughout the play—are arguing about the future of the shop. Montrellous lets slip that Clyde has fallen into “gambling debt,” and that the shop is somehow mixed up in the trouble. That’s the only thing we ever really learn—or, at least, think we learn—about Clyde. She rings a bell when new orders come in, appearing at the window to the kitchen all of a sudden, like a poltergeist at the climax of a horror flick. She rages through the kitchen, spewing just enough bile to get the objects of her tyranny complaining again, but she’s never subjected to the kind of scrutiny that makes watching a character worthwhile.
More...
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/12/06/the-search-for-justification-in-clydes-and-trouble-in-mind
***
Food is more than a plot point in Clyde’s–it’s the show’s foundation. “I was thinking about the tension of opposites in food, like savory and sweet,” Nottage tells me, recounting the writing process. “Things that are dissonant and harmonious, and how they shouldn’t work, but somehow when combined, they do.” By juxtaposing slice-of-life workplace comedy with precise social commentary, Nottage showcases her ability to mine the painful nuances of everyday life for much needed nuggets of humor. “After what we’ve been through this last year, people want to laugh,” Nottage says candidly. “People want to be reminded that, at the end of the tunnel, there is hope and joy.”
“Baby eggplant parmigiana with puttanesca on an olive and rosemary ciabatta,” Rafael pitches to the group in one scene. “Bacon, lettuce and grilled squash on cornbread with molasses butter,” Letitia responds. “Curried quail egg salad with mint on oven-fresh cranberry pecan multigrain bread,” Montrellous declares, getting the final word in before Clyde yells for American cheese on white, snapping everyone back to work.
More...
https://www.bonappetit.com/story/clydes-lynn-nottage
***
Nottage, the first woman to have won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama twice — the first in 2009 for “Ruined,” and the second in 2017 for “Sweat” — has often been accused of being insufficiently commercial for Broadway; here it feels like she’s deliberately satirizing that judgement with an allegorical cattle prod that likely will still be fun for audiences who are blissfully oblivious to all of the insider stuff that has riven Broadway in recent months.
It’s a very clever play, buoyed by lively performances and a director willing to take risks. I suspect “Clyde’s” will be talked about for a good while among Broadway insiders.
The allegory has its limits. The restaurant ends up a big hit, thanks to Montrellous’ work, and it’s never logical why Clyde is so opposed to the great but still simple sandwiches that apparently are making her so profitable. I think Nottage is trying to say that producers (and maybe capitalist Broadway itself) constantly underestimates the public and that if only the artists were in charge, success and good art would come out of the oven.
More...
https://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/broadway/ny-clydes-second-stage-broadway-review-20211124-a7ukn4crg5egvp52uioa2jpjpq-story.html
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*** OPPORTUNITIES FOR PLAYWRIGHTS ***
PSA, the Journal of the Pirandello Society of America seeks submissions of
short dramatic pieces (5 to 30 minutes of expected performance time) inspired
by Luigi Pirandello’s short stories, for publication in the next or future
issues. An essential requirement is that proposed dramaturgies draw inspiration
from Pirandello’s short stories.
***
Last Frontier Theater Conference ~ up to 200 submissions will be accepted from
new applicants; at that point, full-length submissions will only be open for
Alaskans, past participants. New folks will still be able to submit plays 30
minutes and under.
***
Heartland Theatre Company is seeking eight 10-minute original plays to be
considered for production in June of 2023 as part of our 20th annual 10-minute
play festival. This year, the theme is THE WAITING ROOM.
*** FOR MORE INFORMATION about these and other opportunities see the web site
at https://www.nycplaywrights.org
***
*** CROSS-DRESSING MUSICALS ***
These periodic speeches of “we-get-it-we-really-do” rather undermine Tootsie’s
central conceit: a male actor dresses as a woman to get work, leading to a
woman falling for him as a woman, and a man falling for him as a woman. The
experience teaches Michael—well, what exactly? How hard it is to be a woman,
and phew, he’s ultimately very happy to be a man, albeit one who’s learned
something about sexism.
While there is no overt homophobia or misogyny in either movie or stage show,
note that the central “joke” in both of Tootsie’s intimate scenarios is that
Michael’s cross-dressing could lead to, with both male and female suitors—oh
no—two variants of a same-sex kiss or attraction, and Michael is a straight guy
in a dress! Stop the clocks!
More...
https://www.thedailybeast.com/tootsie-on-broadway-a-cross-dressing-classic-gets-a-large-spoonful-of-woke
***
“As the producers of Mrs. Doubtfire made clear in their statement on December
2, 'they have taken feedback and notes from people representing different
constituencies who have seen rehearsals as part of the process of making the
show.' One GLAAD employee attended a rehearsal, but not in an official
consulting capacity. No formal feedback from GLAAD has been given to producers.
Conversations between the show’s producers and GLAAD continue.
“Some media stories have implied that Mrs. Doubtfire has worked with GLAAD,
while Tootsie did not. On the contrary, GLAAD has been working closely with the
producers and creative team of Tootsie during its rehearsal process and
Broadway run, to make sure any concerns from members of the transgender
community are addressed. It has been a collaborative and productive
relationship. GLAAD’s insights and suggestions have been met with understanding
and have been implemented into the production where needed.
More...
https://playbill.com/article/exclusive-glaad-responds-to-mrs-doubtfire-and-tootsie-reports
***
After much self-ballyhooing, this much anticipated revival of the musical 1776
has arrived, and the trend-makers (and Hamilton whisperers) at the American
Repertory Theater and Roundabout Repertory Theatre Company also draw on the
signing of the Declaration of Independence as a way to reenvision history. In
this version, the roles of the members of the first Continental Congress —
white men all — are performed by a multiracial, multigenerational cast that
includes only female, nonbinary, and transgender performers.
Like so many 20th-century plays and musicals, 1776, which opened on Broadway in
1969, desperately calls for an update. In the over half a century since the
show won three Tony Awards, including Best Musical, many of the air-brushed
myths about our founding fathers have been undermined. Among the complicating
facts: of the 47 original signers of our first guiding document, 34 were
slaveholders. Perhaps no one in that First Congress has been the subject of a
more radical change of heart than the author of the Declaration himself, Thomas
Jefferson. Jefferson (played with grit and underlying anger by Elizabeth A.
Davis) is one of the show’s three leading characters. His sexual involvement
with his slave Sally Hemings after his wife’s death resulted in six children.
The other two leads are John Adams (Crystal Lucas-Perry, who is solid in the
role, but not nearly obnoxious or disliked enough) and Benjamin Franklin (the
wonderful, but too understated, Patrena Murray). The action of the narrative
spans two months during a blistering hot Philadelphia summer in May and June of
1776, culminating with the signing of the Declaration on July 4.
More...
https://artsfuse.org/257661/theater-review-1776-still-an-egg-in-the-theatrical-incubator/
***
One can fit a number of genres and genders under a dress-wearing umbrella —
there are men and male-presenting performers playing women, playing men playing
women, wearing dresses for drama, wearing dresses for laughs, wearing dresses
as a means of self-expression. And many artists see drag, performed by people
of all genders, as its own distinct category of stylized performance.
Each new production prompts a new round of reflection, conversation, and
occasionally controversy over whether these characterizations are sexist,
transphobic, dated or delightful. The musical adaptation of “Some Like It Hot,”
a 1959 movie starring Jack Lemmon, Tony Curtis and Marilyn Monroe, promises
that the film’s plot and characters “have been updated for a modern audience,”
and one of its lead actors is nonbinary.
One long-running production is now rethinking its practice. Since 1996,
“Chicago” has featured a character, Mary Sunshine, played by a male soprano
dressed as a woman, whose wig is dramatically removed to reinforce the line,
“things are not always as they appear to be.” But the show has just posted a
notice inviting performers of “any gender identity” to audition for the role;
asked about the change, Barry Weissler, a lead producer, said: “Our collective
understanding of gender and the art of drag has evolved over the past two
decades. We updated our casting breakdown to reflect this.”
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/09/theater/comedy-gender-some-like-it-hot.html
***
At first glance, the Kinky Boots represent the fruits of two New Yorkers who
have made countless contributions to American literature, theater, music, and
film. The glittery, thigh-high, men’s boots worn in a theatrical production by
a cross-dressing character who vividly speak up for an often-misunderstood
community. They also represent one of New York City’s most vibrant industries.
Within the context of the musical, the boots symbolize a timely message of
tolerance and an appreciation for cultural and human differences. For
centuries, works of art have been analyzed for the light they can shed on the
cultures that produced them. As works of art and objects of material culture,
the boots offer an opportunity to reflect on contemporary debates about gender,
discrimination, and intolerance.
More...
https://www.nyhistory.org/blogs/heels-history-sparkly-red-kinky-boots-tell-us-american-culture
***
The arrival in the West End in March of a stage musical version of the hit
Australian film The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert will continue
that dialogue as three drag queens reinvent themselves as a family unit aboard
a tour bus.
Cross-dressing has lately been used to explore these matters, but the theatre
has always been about dressing up – not least for the very practical reason
that women were banned acting on the Greek and Shakespearean stage, forcing men
to play the women's roles.
Nowadays, of course, those prohibitions are long gone and women are laying
claim to men's roles. As Michael Billington has previously argued: "There
should be much more gender switching in the classics: not least because women
are otherwise excluded from great roles."
If such gender switches are to be welcomed, is it important for the actor to
share the sexuality of the role he or she is playing? Fierstein, for his part,
has fought to have gay men play Albin in La Cage. He says in a programme note
to the current production: "If you stand up and sing 'I Am What I Am'
without feeling your sexuality and your persecution right down to your painted
toenails, it's never going to be quite the same thing."
More...
https://www.theguardian.com/stage/theatreblog/2008/nov/05/drag-hairspray-priscilla-wig-out
***
Booking is now open for La Cage Aux Folles, and the FM Theatre
Productions and Teatru Manoel co-production will continue the legacy in Malta
of this internationally acclaimed musical, which has won multiple Tony Awards
including Best Musical, Best Score, Best Book and Best Musical Revival, as well
as a Laurence Olivier Award.
“We can’t wait to present La Cage Aux Folles at the Manoel
this October,” says FM Theatre Productions founder and managing director Edward
Mercieca. “This crowd-pleasing, rollicking and heart-warming musical about
family, commitment, show biz and drag is one of musical theatre’s all-time
biggest hits and is sure to become one of Malta’s as well.”
Based on the 1973 French play by Jean Poiret, La Cage Aux Folles tells
a funny and moving story that also served as inspiration for the much-loved
movie The Birdcage, starring Robin Williams and Nathan Lane.
After 20 years of partnered bliss, gay couple Georges and Albin run a drag
nightclub in Saint-Tropez, where Albin is the star performer known as Zaza.
When Georges’ son announces his impending marriage to the daughter of a
bigoted, ultra-conservative politician, M Dindon, Georges reluctantly agrees to
masquerade as ‘normal’ to meet the family of the bride-to-be – but Albin has
other plans, with hilarious results!
Featuring a book by Harvey Fierstein and music and lyrics by Jerry Herman,
the FM Theatre/Teatru Manoel production of La Cage Aux Folles boasts
an all-star cast including Mikhail Basmadjian as Georges, Ray Calleja as Albin
and Edward Mercieca as M Dindon. An equally impressive supporting cast features
Raphael Pace, Jasmine Farrugia, Francesco Nicodeme, Maria Eleonora Zammit,
Krista Zammit Marmara and Sean Borg, among many others. Meanwhile, FM’s
extraordinary creative team behind the production includes director Christopher
Gatt, musical director Kris Spiteri and choreographer Francesco Nicodeme, with
vocal coach Tina Frendo.
More...
https://www.indulge.com.mt/rollicking-musical-la-cage-aux-folles-to-dazzle-audiences-at-the-manoel/
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*** OPPORTUNITIES FOR PLAYWRIGHTS ***
SOUNDBITES 2023 seeks 10-minute musicals
Theatre Now defines a 10-minute musical as any piece that can be performed in
max. 10min, has a beginning, middle, end story arch, and includes music. Having
produced over 70 pieces, we want musicals that are diverse, current, test the
musical form and communicate a well-crafted story. We accept musicals across
all styles and genres, as well as consider foreign language and/or bilingual
scripts. We strongly encourage submissions from female writers, BIPOC and
LGBTQ+ writers.
***
The Phoenix Theatre Company’s 25th Annual Festival of New American Theatre will
run April 7, 2023 – April 23, 2023. The 2023 Festival will feature both curated
and submitted works including: one play reading, two musical readings, one
musical workshop, the Composer Lyricist Cabaret featuring two artists, and the
Choreography Lab which will set movement to musical material featured in the
festival selections. All eligible submissions are welcome and we are actively
seeking submissions from artists with an Arizona connection.
***
The Stonecoast Review: A Multi-Genre Literary Journal
We seek work from both emerging and established writers. The goal of the
Stonecoast Review literary journal is to publish innovative and deeply resonant
literature that embodies our core values of justice, awareness, and
exploration. Just like the Stonecoast program, we promote work that runs the
gamut from poetry to popular fiction, including everything in-between. We pride
ourselves on placing the work of writers from all backgrounds, genres, and
styles, onto the same stage. The Stonecoast Review is edited by students and
alumni from Stonecoast’s low-residency MFA Program in Creative Writing through
the University of Southern Maine.
*** FOR MORE INFORMATION about these and other opportunities see the web site
at https://www.nycplaywrights.org
***
*** BRITISH ROYALTY ON STAGE ***
As embodied by an unimpeachably authoritative Ms. Mirren, this second Elizabeth
II is betraying just enough emotion to make her embraceably human but not
enough to embarrass anyone, not even the woman she’s playing.
And for those whose sympathies are troublingly divided between the monarch and
the common people, this production suggests that the Queen may at heart be “a
good Labour woman.” That at least is the conclusion of Prime Minister Harold
Wilson (a folksy Richard McCabe, an audience favorite), who says, “Deep down,
you’re not just happier with the normal folks, you’re one of us.”
Directed with restrained flair by Stephen Daldry, and designed with a
voyeuristic elegance by Bob Crowley, “The Audience” seems destined to reign in
the West End as an exercise in reassurance for uncertain times. It’s a sort of
starched-bosomed nanny of a play, offering the artistic equivalent of nursery
food and equally digestible history lessons.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/07/theater/reviews/the-audience-in-london-stars-helen-mirren.html
***
The play that provides the springboard for Mr. Hawthorne's triumph is by Alan
Bennett, who is arguably the best playwright in England whose major works
remain unproduced in the American theater. "The Madness of George
III" is not one of those major works, but it would be silly to complain
too much about a play that gives audiences a chance to savor an unforgettable
performance. And it's easy to see why "George III," in its original
Royal National Theater production directed by Nicholas Hytner, has been sent on
American tour while tougher Bennett works like "Single Spies" and
"Talking Heads" have been limited to piecemeal presentation on public
television. With its 18th-century pomp and circumstance, large cast, flourishes
of Handel and opulent rustle of costumes, "George III" is more
readily marketable as the sort of Broadway entertainment the Colonies are
thought to prefer.
More...
https://www.nytimes.com/1993/09/17/theater/review-theater-the-madness-of-george-iii-creating-a-lovable-george-iii.html
***
In Hamilton, King George terrifies his servants, laughs maniacally, and
threatens to "kill your friends and family to remind you of my love."
However, the real George III was not nearly as bumbling or evil as the musical
depicts. Despite experiencing relatively slow mental development as a child,
George III was precocious as a teenager. At 12, he suddenly became heir
apparent to the British Crown after the death of his father, George II, and he
was coronated at the age of 22.
More...
https://screenrant.com/hamilton-musical-king-george-changes-differences-missing/
***
Most of Shakespeare’s history plays surround the Plantagenet Kings: Richard II,
Henry IV Part 1, Henry IV Part 2, Henry V, Henry VI Part 1, Henry VI Part 2,
Henry VI Part 3, and Richard III. I learned early on three important concepts
for success in reading these plays: First, a character could be referred to by
his name or his title, so in the case of Richard, a character might refer to
his first name, or to his title of “Gloucester”–the land where he ruled as
Duke. Secondly, medieval England operated under primogeniture, which
meant that the estate and titles passed to the oldest male heir in the family.
Finally, English ruling families reused names a lot–there are Richards, Henrys,
and Edwards all over this family tree! With these rules in mind, let’s dig into
Shakespeare’s Plantagenet kings. (And a disclaimer: This is not meant to
embrace all of the intrigues and nuances of English history or Shakespeare’s
plays, but it is a starting point for understanding the complex history
Shakespeare was working with.)
More...
https://blog.stageagent.com/shakespeares-history-plays-unraveling-the-kings/
***
To Washington's National Theatre one night last week Anna Eleanor Roosevelt took
Secretary of the Treasury & Mrs. Henry Morgenthau Jr. to see Helen Hayes as
Victoria Regina. So charmed was Mrs. Roosevelt by Actress Hayes' performance
that when the play ended, she stood up in her box, clapped for five curtain
calls. Next day she had Miss Hayes in to the White House for luncheon and at 3
p. m. Actress Hayes hurried back to her hotel suite in high excitement,
canceled half a dozen appointments, summoned a beautician to fix her bobbed
hair. That evening by special invitation she went back to the White House for 8
o'clock dinner and the glittering Diplomatic Reception which followed. Clearly
Helen Hayes had made a profound impression upon the Presidential family. And
critics who watched her Washington tryout forecast another hit for her when
Victoria Regina opens on Broad way this week.
Victoria Regina, For those who make a hobby of Actress Hayes' career, Victoria
Regina can be considered a sort of retrospective exhibition of some of the
memorable parts she has played on her way up to the top during the past 17
years. Scene 1 represents the entrance hall at Kensing ton Palace early one
morning in 1837. Lord Conyngham, the Prime Minister and the Archbishop of
Canterbury have come to rouse William IV's niece out of bed, tell her of her
uncle's death and her succession to the Throne of England. Suddenly Actress
Hayes appears, long locks falling to her shoulders, a night dress sweeping the
floor. She receives the news without a word, but by some alchemy of gesture and
expression, manages to convey in full the young queen's terrific bewilderment,
anxiety and delight. Those who saw Miss Hayes a good 16 years ago as the
extraordinary dream-child in Dear Brutus could almost hear the echo of her
plaintive cry, "I don't want to be a might-have-been!"
More...
https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,848403,00.html
Helen Hayes and Vincent Price in Victoria Regina
https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/helen-hayes-as-queen-victoria-and-vincent-price-as-prince-news-photo/526899010
***
“On the eve of the beheading of her court favorite and rumored lover, the Earl
of Essex, Queen Elizabeth was entertained with a royal command performance by
Shakespeare and his company (of Much Ado About Nothing). Longing for
distraction, the Queen visits her stables where the actors are lodged for the
night. There she finds the man who plays Shakespeare’s leading ladies (here as
Beatrice), and in their passionate confrontation, the actor and his Queen come
to shocking revelations about sexuality, identity and love.” (from the press
notes)
That simple summary thrives as we meet the quirky 17th Century thespians led by
William Shakespeare (played understated by Kevin Gudhal) and the rag-tag actors
that included a drunkard, an old man living in the past and a quirky seamstress
and a dying actor more woman than man. When the queen arrives, Ned is her
outspoken opponent since his eminent death from the pox allows him the freedom
to say whatever comes to his mind. The debate rages on as the two engage in
verbal debate. Elizabeth hides her female side as a mechanism for sovereign
survival – ruling as a man works for her. Ned has played woman all his life in
Shakespeare’s plays and as a gay man feels more comfortable as a woman.
More...
https://chicagocritic.com/elizabeth-rex/
***
Everyone likes secrets, especially dramatists. So it’s no surprise that the
unraveling of the mysteries of the current Queen Elizabeth’s famously
undocumented weekly meetings with her prime minister proved audience catnip in
Peter Morgan’s fictional “The Audience” starring Helen Mirren. But playwright
Moira Buffini got there first with “Handbagged,” a 2010 short about the queen
vs. Margaret Thatcher, since expanded into a full-length comedy that just
bagged an Olivier Award. Pin-sharp performances and Buffini’s fleet and
delicious script ignite Indhu Rubasingham’s highly enjoyable West End transfer.
Not content with mere neat impersonations of the two stateswomen who were
heavily rumored to have had a difficult relationship, Buffini upsets
expectations with a smart dramaturgical trick. Audiences settle into the
opening niceties of Marion Bailey’s devastating embodiment of the queen (the
grim set of her mouth, the arm held tight to the waist with fluttering fingers)
meeting Stella Gonet’s braying and loftily hair-sprayed Mrs. Thatcher. Then up
pop younger, contrary versions of themselves, played, respectively by firmly
well-bred Lucy Robinson and, with uncanny precision, a magnificently
patronizing, breathy Fenella Woolgar.
More...
https://variety.com/2014/legit/reviews/west-end-review-handbagged-1201158243/
