Miss Shakespeare turns gender bias on its ear

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This article was published 29/09/2024 (743 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Winnipeg Studio Theatre kicked off its season with the guts and glory of female empowerment in its all-women-led local premiere of Miss Shakespeare.

The two-hour musical — directed by company artistic director Erin McGrath and presented by Rainbow Stage — runs through Oct. 5 at the University of Winnipeg’s Asper Centre for Theatre and Film. Saturday night’s crowd eagerly lapped up its feminist ethos.

Its quasi-historical protagonist, Judith Shakespeare (played by a spunky Rhea Rodych-Rasidescu), is the Bard’s real-life daughter “born with a poetic soul.” Judith lives in the shadows of her famous father during the repressive 1600s, when women were relegated to becoming wives and mothers, rather than pursuing their own passions.

Judith yearns for her own identity as a self-actualized creative powerhouse, and cobbles together the “Gossips,” a merry band of like-minded women who surreptitiously meet each week in the bowels of The Cage tavern to create a play. They spar, share stories, and dream, risking public humiliation if they’re discovered treading the boards like their male counterparts.

Vancouver Island-born playwright Tracey’s Power’s book and lyrics, penned in 2013, are often as sharp as a rapier’s edge, ranging from bawdy, vernacular prose to clever rhyming couplets. Power’s writing ensures the spirit of Shakespeare — both father and daughter — is always close at hand.

Equally engaging is an original score of European cabaret-style songs that would be right at home in the Weimar Republic circa 1930s. The songs were co-written by Power with Steve Charles, and performed by the seven-member, multi-generational cast: an example of the wealth of musical talent in our fair city.

As tavern mistress Judith Quiney, longtime local theatre artist Ellen Peterson brings gravitas to the stage and sagely propels the narrative. Peterson also morphs into a “living ghost” of the iconic English playwright during a series of dream sequences. In them, William Shakespeare’s challenging of his second-born daughter’s aspirations creates a palpable power struggle that chills to the bone.

At that moment, music from the live onstage band could have been far more dramatic. Instead, a tepid thunder sheet announced Will’s arrival via musical director/pianist Renate Rossol and double bassist Glenda Rempel.

Rodych-Rasidescu crafts her spitfire lead character as a rebel with a cause, declaring early to the Gossips that she “wants to create something that’s never been created by a woman before.” That becomes her personal manifesto while she fights for her rightful place in the annals of history.

As the story progresses, each colourful character reveals her own backstory of struggles and travails. The script is laced with one-line zingers. As in all good playwriting, expect several effective, surprise plot twists (no spoiler alerts here).

Julia Davis’s all-too-human Margaret Moore suffers from terminal virginity, wed to her husband for nine-years in an unconsummated marriage. Davis’s well-nuanced, compassionate portrayal shows us the darker underbelly of love.

Jillian Willems’s prim and proper Susanna Hall (née Shakespeare), Judith’s older sister, is torn between loyalty to her Christian faith and familial ties that bind.

We also feel Dora Carroll’s pain as Katherine Rose, who admits she can’t read — echoing the ongoing fight to secure girls’ education in some cultures — loses her 19th child in miscarriage and blames her “weak womb.”

It’s impossible to keep your eyes off Hera Nalam, her razor sharp comedic chops bringing to life feisty tomboy Isabel Loxley with “nine older brothers” who morphs between human and beast as the Gossips practice their plays.

Andrea del Campo also mesmerizes as Hannah Storley, “bastard daughter of John Storley,” who works at the tavern, with her no-holds-barred, bluesy solo “Just a Name” showing us the raw vulnerability of society’s most marginalized, disenfranchised members.

Featuring period costumes and lighting by Anika Binding, the show comes with its own content warning. Eliciting guffaws from the weekend audience, the cast gleefully performed dirtier ditties including Judith’s eye-popping “His Ass,” and the deliciously alliterative “Put Your Pizzle in your Pants” as cast members swing suggestively rolled-up napkins with shimmies and shakes choreographed by Rachael McLaren. One can only imagine the hijinks in the rehearsal hall.

Some sections admittedly lag, such as during the second act’s overly extended “The Great Waltz of Atalanta,” with designer Carrie Costello’s admittedly weird puppet making a sudden appearance. The first act’s all-too-fleeting re-enactment of Shakespeare’s buffoonish Pyramus and Thisbe scene from A Midsummer Night’s Dream becomes a missed opportunity for riotous belly laughs.

The singing is terrific throughout, with the closely-knit cast taking turns delivering such dynamic solos as Judith’s “Wild Sweet Abandon,” or Isabelle’s “The Little Soldier,” as well as belting out ear-pleasing harmonies.

Special mention goes to Carroll, who breaks our hearts during her solo “Tumbling,” in which she lists all her lost children by name and describes what might have been had they lived. Carroll packs an emotional wollop in the song’s last line, “No happy birthdays, just tombstones in their place.”

As the Gossips daringly take the limelight for a public performance at the end, Judith fully steps into her own power as a self-determining, female artist during her showstopper “Here I Am,” boldly stripping her kingly costume away to reveal her “soft skin” and feminine curves, while inspiring her compatriots to the do the same.

A final reprise of “Passion” bids a parting message to viewers of all genders: “harness your right to passion,” a sentiment that never grows old.

For tickets or further information, see: winnipegstudiotheatre.com

Holly.harris@shaw.ca