l3064 gender and theatre week 10r

What Is Gender Studies?: 

What Is Gender Studies? Gender and Theatre

Gender and Theatre: 

Gender and Theatre Biological sex and gender identity Gender as role Role playing Masculinity and feminity Gender Studies as Women’s Studies? Sexual difference – gay/theatre, cross-dressing, ‘drag’

Divine (Andy Warhol) & Hetty King (London music hall): 

Divine (Andy Warhol) & Hetty King (London music hall)

Gender and Theatre: Jill Dolan ‘Gender Impersonation Onstage’: 

Gender and Theatre: Jill Dolan ‘Gender Impersonation Onstage’ Theatre as mirror, reflection of social and cultiral organisation and gender roles Theatre as question – subversion, multiplication, expansion of identity Performance – enabling playful elaboration of role Representation of gender stereotype – polarised gender, heightened masculinity and feminity Subversion of gender stereotype – masculine woman, feminine man

Gender and Theatre:Cynthia Running-Johnson ‘Feminine writing and its theatrical ‘other’’ : 

Gender and Theatre: Cynthia Running-Johnson ‘Feminine writing and its theatrical ‘other’’ Feminine writing – écriture féminine (Hélène Cixous) Multiplicity, excessiveness, exchange and transformation vs masculine ‘unity’ and ‘investment’ Theatre, performance – ‘reign of the multiple and of transformation’ ‘Voice’ and physicality – theatre and the body

Gender and Theatre: 

Gender and Theatre Aristophanes (c447-385?) Lysistrata (411 BCE) William Shakespeare Twelfth Night, or What You Will (1600-1602 CE) Caryl Churchill Top Girls (1982 CE)

Aristophanes Lysistrata: 

Aristophanes Lysistrata Lysistrata, Calonice, Myrrhine – Athenian women Lampito – a Spartan woman Chorus of Old Men, Chorus of Old Women Stratyllis, Leader of Women’s Chorus A Magistrate, member of the Committee of Ten for the Safety of the State Five Young women Cinesias, husband of Myrrhine; Baby son of Cinesias and Murrhine A Spartan herald, a Spartan ambassador, an Athenian negotiator Two layabouts, doorkeeper of the Acropolis, two diners Ismenia, a Boeotian Woman: a Corinthian woman Reconciliation, maidservant of Lysistrata Four Scythian policemen, a Scythian policewoman Athenian citizens, Spartan ambassadors, Athenian and Spartan women, slaves etc

Gender and Theatre: 

Gender and Theatre Conditions and conventions of ancient Greek theatre: Open air, amphitheatre, capacity 14,000 City festival, civic and religious – Lenaea (January) & Dionysia (March) – comedy and tragedy) No women actors – all female roles played by men Protagonists and chorus (double chorus) Aristophanes – Old Comedy of Athens

Gender and Theatre: 

Gender and Theatre Lysistrata – political comedy Pelopponesian Wars (431-421, 415-405 BCE) – Athens and allies vs Sparta, Athens finally defeated Women for peace – men for war Political non-status of women, cf male citizens Battle of the sexes – for sex and peace Reconciliation – of Greece

Shakespeare Twelfth Night: 

Shakespeare Twelfth Night Orsino, Duke of Illyria; Valentine and Curio, gentlemen attending on Orsino First Officer, Second Officer Viola, a shipwrecked lady, later disguised as Cesario Sebastian, her twin brother Captain of the wrecked ship; Antonio, another sea captain Olivia, a Countess; Maria, her waiting-gentlewoman Sir Toby Belch, her uncle; Sir Andrew Aguecheek, Sir Toby’s protégé Malvolio, Olivia’s steward; Fabian, a member of her household Feste, her jester; a priest, a servant Musicians, lords, sailors, attendants

Gender and Theatre: 

Gender and Theatre Conditions and conventions of Elizabethan theatre: Public, outdoor, commercial (The Globe); private, indoor, court or Inns of Court Festive occasion (1602) – Christmas-New Year: Feast of the Epiphany - Christian No women actors – all female roles played by men Leading and minor roles

Gender and Theatre: 

Gender and Theatre Twelfth Night – romantic or festive comedy Complications of identity – across gender Celebration of festivity against puritan killjoys, e.g. Malvolio (ill-will) Saturnalia, Lord of Misrule, the Fool – licensed subversion of authority, of normal status quo Restitution of ‘true’ identities and relations

Churchill Top Girls: 

Churchill Top Girls Marlene, proprietor of ‘Top Girls’ employment agency Joyce, her sister; Angie, her daughter, supposedly her niece, 16 years old Kit, Angie’s friend, 12 years old Mrs Kidd, wife of Howard Kidd (non-appearing) employee of the agency; Win and Nell, employees of the agency; Jeanine, Louise, and Shona, prospective employees of the agency Waitress; Isabella Bird (1831-1904) Victorian lady traveller [Joyce, Mrs Kidd]; Lady Nijo (b 1258), Japanese Emperor’s courtesan, later Buddhist nun [Win]; Dull Gret, subject of Breughel painting ‘Dulle Griet’ [Angie]; Pope Joan , according to medieval account, disguised herself as a man and was elected Pope (854-856) [Louise]; Patient Griselda, obedient wife in the Clerk’s Tale from Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales [Nell]

Gender and Theatre: 

Gender and Theatre Conditions and conventions of today’s theatre: Varied and eclectic: commercial, cosmopolitan, multimedia Indoor theatre, technologically developed Naturalism – or ‘documentary’ realism Anti-naturalism: fantasy, surrealism, symbolism

Gender and Theatre: 

Gender and Theatre Top Girls - political-social drama – tragicomedy? Churchill, woman dramatist Churchill’s theatrical practice – Joint Stock Company – group workshops, development through improvisation and rehearsal Marlene’s employment agency ‘Top Girls’ – exclusion of men Thatcherism – the masculine woman? Marlene vs Joyce

Further Reading: 

Further Reading Aston, Elaine (1995) An Introduction to Feminism and Theatre, London: Routledge Butler, Judith (1990) Gender Trouble: feminism and the subversion of identity Stephen Orgel (1996) Impersonations : The Performance of Gender in Shakespeare's England, Cambridge: CUP Laurence Senelick (2000) The Changing Room : Sex, Drag and Theatre Routledge Stage Beauty (film, 2004, directed Richard Eyre, screenwriter Jeffrey Hatcher, based on his play Compleat Female Stage Beauty)