6 July: A Doll's House

I have a large number of scripts at home and one book that I keep picking up and thinking 'Oh, no, we can't do that' is a compilation of plays by Ibsen.

This weekend I decided I'd start reading one of the plays, and having done a Google decided the one to go for was A Doll's House.  I started reading it - and was so entranced by the writing and the story that I continued to read it in one sitting.  I was completely hooked!  And I do hope that you will be to!  

The play, first performed in 1879 in Denmark, is important because it marked a turning point in the theatre with its critical look at 19th Century marriage norms and scandalous ending!  Indeed in 1891 Ibsen very reluctantly wrote an alternate ending, under strong pressure, for the German theatre.  It is just a few lines, and we can read them at the end of the afternoon: they give the play an entirely different meaning and his reluctance is understandable.

I do not want to give away the ending, but Ibsen was inspired by the belief that "a woman cannot be herself in modern society," since it is "an exclusively male society, with laws made by men and with prosecutors and judges who assess feminine conduct from a masculine standpoint." However in 1898 he insisted that his writing was not propaganda for the Women's Rights Movement but for humanity.

Main Characters

• Nora Helmer – wife of Torvald, mother of three, is living out the ideal of the 19th-century wife, but leaves her family at the end of the play.
• Torvald Helmer – Nora's husband, a newly promoted bank manager, suffocates but professes to be enamoured of his wife.
• Dr. Rank – a rich family friend, he is secretly in love with Nora. He is terminally ill, and it is implied that his "tuberculosis of the spine" originates from a venereal disease contracted by his father.
• Kristine Linde – Nora's old school friend, widowed, is seeking employment (sometimes spelled Christine in English translations). She was in a relationship with Krogstad prior to the play's setting.
• Nils Krogstad – an employee at Torvald's bank, single father, he is pushed to desperation. A supposed scoundrel, he is revealed to be a long-lost lover of Kristine.

I like to find some pictures to give you a flavour of the plays we are reading.  Looking for pictures for this play was fascinating.

Here is a picture of the original German production, which had the ending re-written.

And then were these ...

... and these - the gilded cage a repeated metaphor.

And finally this one, which reminded me of The Yellow Wallpaper, an important feminist text from 1892.

Henrik Johan Ibsen (1828 – 1906)

Born in Norway, Ibsen is a well-known playwright, director and poet, and a founder of the Modernism movement in theatre.  He has many major works which are considered as classics today.

Several of his later dramas were considered scandalous to many of his era, when European theatre was expected to model strict morals of family life and propriety. Ibsen's later work examined the realities that lay behind many façades, revealing much that was disquieting to many contemporaries. It utilized a critical eye and free inquiry into the conditions of life and issues of morality. 

25 May: Victoria Wood

As we are unable to meet the first Wednesday of June, we will instead be meeting on Wednesday 25 May.

At the end of the last play reading, which was a rather sombre piece, some of us thought it would be fun to pay homage to the very talented and sadly departed Victoria Wood.

I have a book of her short pieces, but thought it would be nice to do something longer, and the last copy that Amazon had of Victoria  Wood Plays 1 arrived through my letterbox this morning!

I have, therefore, not yet had time to decide exactly what we'll be reading, but it will be either Talent, Good Fun or Pat & Margaret.

Victoria Wood CBE 1953-2016

4 May: The Father

Le Père is a 2012 play by the French playwright Florian Zeller which won in 2014 the Molière Award for Best Play. It was made into the film Floride (2015).  Zeller is a young writer who has won many awards including the 2011 Molière Award for Best Play for his earlier work, The Mother.  

Florian Zeller

This is a moving play about a man suffering dementia, and the affect it has on his life and the lives of those around him.  For those of you who have seen relatives suffer this horrible illness it will no doubt strike a nerve and you might find it quite emotional.

I first heard it on the radio, and found that you are drawn in and are unsure whether and when Andre, the father, is living in the here and now or the past. Another discombobulation is the fact that he is a French man, in Paris, speaking in English. Please don't ask me to explain, but for this play it did seem odd.

The Father is currently playing in London to rave reviews, starring Kenneth Cranham and Claire Skinner.

6 April: The Hard Problem

The much-anticipated The Hard Problem has received somewhat mixed reviews.  I am always nervous when approaching a work by Stoppard as he is so very very clever and intellectual that watching one of his plays can be quite taxing and not an easy night out.  But I found this play not only strangely accessible but also in some respects a disappointment: I don't want to give away the ending, but for me it was too neat.  Here are some extracts from reviews.

From The Telegraph:

Sir Tom Stoppard’s new play, his first in nine years, is called The Hard Problem – a reference to the difficulty scientists and philosophers have in fathoming the nature of human consciousness. Watching it has left me with a hard problem of my own. I want to salute Stoppard, now 77 and one of our finest living playwrights ... But there’s no getting round it: this is a major disappointment.

From The Observer:

The “hard problem” of the title is the problem of consciousness. Where is it? What is it? Crucially, is “the mind” the same as “the brain”? The joy of the play, his first for nine years, is that it brings this problem to the stage and poses it crisply. The difficulty is that Stoppard then glides away from examining it. Often taxed with being too intellectual as a playwright, he is here not intellectually stringent enough. The great adventurer looks strangely conventional. 

From The Guardian:

A rich, ideas-packed work that offers a defence of goodness whatever its ultimate source... Stoppard’s play may not solve the hard problem of human consciousness. But it offers endless stimulation and represents, like so much of his work, a search for absolute values and a belief in the possibility of selfless virtue.

The Hard Problem

Hilary, a young psychology researcher at a brain-science institute, is nursing a private sorrow and a troubling question at work, where psychology and biology meet. If there is nothing but matter, what is consciousness?

This is 'the hard problem' which puts Hilary at odds with her colleagues who include her first mentor Spike, her boss Leo and the billionaire founder of the institute, Jerry.

Is the day coming when the computer and the MRI scanner will answer all the questions psychology can ask? Meanwhile Hilary needs a miracle, and she is prepared to pray for one.

 

Sir Tom Stoppard

Tom Stoppard was born in July 1937 in Czechoslovakia.  He fled from the Nazis as a child refugee to Singapore with his parents and brother. When that became a difficult place to be his father sent his family to Australia and, as a doctor, remained where he felt he was needed, but he died 4 years later.  In 1946 his family moved to the UK, via time in India,  and after studying there Stoppard became a journalist and, in 1960, a playwright.

Stoppard's mother died in 1996. The family had not talked about their history and neither brother knew what had happened to the family left behind in Czechoslovakia^. In the early 1990s, with the fall of communism, Stoppard found out that all four of his grandparents had been Jewish and had died in Auschwitz and other camps, along with three of his mother's sisters.  He has expressed grief both for a lost father and a missing past, but he has no sense of being a survivor, at whatever remove. "I feel incredibly lucky not to have had to survive or die. It's a conspicuous part of what might be termed a charmed life."

He is a prolific writer whose works include many well-known plays and films - including Shakespeare in Love - and he has received many awards.  

His themes are always intellectual and his works include discussions on human rights; censorship; political freedom; linguistics and philosophy. 

Cancellation: 3 Feb due to Flu

I'm so sorry - hope to see you all on 2 March! 

3 February: Love, Loss and What I Wore

January once again proved, to me, that our little group really brings out more of a play than just a mere read-through on ones own.

But before I start on about The Vagina Monologues I must thank Rina for the absolutely delicious Galette des Rois: I had never had such a lovely one in my nearly 14 yeas here.  And congratulations to Isaobel, our 'Queen for the Day'!

I had seen The Vagina Monologues some years ago, and my memory was of a fun evening tinged with the raw emotion of the pieces that dealt with genital mutilation and abuse.  When I read the script last year, having suggested we read it as a group, I confess I did start to get cold feet.  But then we read it aloud, and I don't think I was alone in finding it moving, funny and a work which defends the right of women to be women.  Whilst it might seem controversial to use the vagina as a vehicle for this message, it is what makes us women and is a blessing; a curse; a source of shame; a source of joy and many other things.  So thank  you ladies for bringing this work to life - I thought you all coped very well (in fact probably better than me!).

I have been dithering over next month, torn between the latest Tom Stoppard, The Hard Problem, and my eventual choice: Love, Loss and What I Wore.  The main reason for the decision is that I am away from next Wednesday-Tuesday, and I already have this prepared!

So apologies in advance if it seems like I'm repeating the month!

Love, Loss and What I Wore

I came across this play by chance in Hamburg last year at the FEATS festival.  It was read by a group of women and I thought it was fun and perfect for our group ... so here it is!

Love, Loss, and What I Wore is a play written by Nora and Delia Ephron based on the 1995 book of the same name by Ilene Beckerman.

The sisters are interesting.  Daughters of screenwriters, both have followed in their parents footsteps - with marked success. Delia's credits include Sleepless in Seattle and You've Got Mail, and Nora's award-winning works include When Harry Met Sally and Julia & Julia.  Nora died in 2012.

Nora & Delia Ephron

You will find a lot about this play on Wikipedia, and, like The Vagina Monologues  it is a series of monologues.  However, unlike VM, it is based on 5 characters and uses the female wardrobe as a time capsule of a woman's life.

It is a recent, American, play from 2008 which won awards in 2010.  Like The Vagina Monologues it has been used to fundraise for women's charities and has attracted many famous actresses.

The original cast, which included Tyne Daly (2nd left), welcomed a very special visitor!

6 January: The Vagina Monolgues

Firstly, many many thanks for the very kind gift you gave me in December.  At time of writing I am looking forward very much to the theatre trip and dinner (two of my favourite things!).  It was a very thoughtful and appropriate present, but I really must reiterate that I do find this such fun to do and am incredibly grateful that Rina makes it so much easier to administer!

I have to say that I am truly delighted that you all seem to enjoy this group so much: your pleasure really makes it all worth while.

I am so glad that The Play That Goes Wrong went so well and that we were all able to enjoy the humour of the piece even though it relies so much on the physicality of the actors and an amazing set!

January: The Vagina Monolgues

I don't need to tell  you what next month's play is!  I think we all know!  I will not be offended if anyone opts to skip the meeting because they feel this play is a step too far. 

What I will say is that it is a period piece of its time (1996), a ground-breaking feminist work that today might seem rather dated and excessive in its use of 'choice' (non-native English speakers, that's a euphemism for 'rude') language and the subject matter it tackles.

It is not a work I have found easy to include in our schedule.  It started as a bit of a joke, but the more I think about it the more I believe it is a piece of history that we should not be ashamed to read.

Whilst the language might make us blush and giggle with embarrassment, I don't think it's there just for the sake of shocking.  New Yorker Eve Ensler, who at the time was in her early 40s (not that that's particularly relevant!) based her work on real women, many from the poorer parts of American society who will have spoken to her freely.

It is funny, shocking and very moving.  It is a serious work, not just an opportunity for a writer to get people to say or listen to words and sentences that will make us feel uncomfortable.  I hope that those of you who are in two-minds about this work will give it a chance. 

Charles Isherwood of The New York Times called the play "probably the most important piece of political theater of the last decade." In 2011, Ensler was awarded the Isabelle Stevenson Award at the 65th Tony Awards, which recognizes an individual from the theater community who has made a substantial contribution of volunteered time and effort on behalf of humanitarian, social service, or charitable organizations. Ensler originally starred in the production, but since then it has been performed by a variety of famous people as monologues or individual pieces - and of course by amateurs!

In 1998, Ensler and others launched V-Day, a global non-profit movement that has raised over $100 million for groups working to end violence against women and girls anti-violence through benefits of The Vagina Monologues

In a strange twist of fate, in 2010 Ensler revealed that she was receiving treatment for Uterine Cancer.

Wikipedia has a long list of the awards that Ensler has received.  Because I think that this work should not be viewed as a piece designed to shock, rather a work to raise awareness and address female issues, I am reprinting the list in full.  It is very impressive and, I feel, shows how art and social awareness can work together:

• Tony Award – In 2011, Ensler was awarded the Isabelle Stevenson Award at the 65th Tony Awards, which recognizes an individual from the theater community who has made a substantial contribution of volunteered time and effort on behalf of humanitarian, social service, or charitable organizations.
• Obie Award for The Vagina Monologues, 1997
• Guggenheim Fellowship Award in Playwriting, 1999
• Berrilla-Kerr Award for Playwriting, 2000
• Elliot Norton Award for Outstanding Solo Performance, 2001
• Amnesty International Media Spotlight Award for Leadership, 2002
• The Matrix Award, 2002
• Jury Award for Theater at the US Comedy Arts Festival, 2002
• Lion of Judah by the United Jewish Communities, 2002
• Sundance Film Festival's Freedom of Expression Award for What I Want my Words to do to You, 2003
• Honorary Doctor of Letters degree from her alma mater, Middlebury College, 2003
• NETC Theatre Award, a regional Boston theatre award, 2004
• NOW Award from the Intrepid Award Gala, 2004
• The Civil Revolutionary Award from Miami Dade College, 2004
• Award for International Peace Efforts from Cardozo Law School, 2004
• The Avon Award, 2005
• The Sandra Day O'Connor Award from the Arizona Foundation for Women, 2005
• Honorary Doctor of Human Letters from Manhattanville College, 2005
• Honorary Doctor of Communications from Simmons College, 2006
• City of New York Proclamation in honor of founding and her work for V-Day, 2006
• OK2BU Humanitarian Award In recognition of outstanding contributions to the LGBT community, 2006
• Honorary speaker D010 at TED Talks, Dec 2010
• Ensler has also been honored for her effort to end violence against women and girls by such organizations as Planned Parenthood (2004, 2006), The Women's Prison Association (2004), Sahkti (2004), and several LGBT centers (2004, 2006)

Eve Ensler

Some Quotes from The Vagina Monologues

“When you rape, beat, maim, mutilate, burn, bury, and terrorize women, you destroy the essential life energy on the planet.”

“The heart is capable of sacrifice. So is the vagina. The heart is able to forgive and repair. It can change it's shape to let us in. It can expand to let us out. So can the vagina. It can ache for us and stretch for us, die for us and bleed and bleed us into this difficult, wondrous world. So can the vagina. I was there in the room. I remember.”

“No wonder male religious leaders so often say that humans were born in sin—because we were born to female creatures. Only by obeying the rules of the patriarchy can we be reborn through men. No wonder priests and ministers in skirts sprinkle imitation birth fluid over our heads, give us new names, and promise rebirth into everlasting life.”

“Looking at it, I started crying. Maybe it was knowing that I had to give up the fantasy, the enormous life consuming fantasy , that someone or something was going to do this for me – the fantasy that someone was coming to lead my life, to choose direction, to give me orgasms.”

“I didn’t hear words that were accurate, much less prideful. For example, I never once heard the word clitoris. It would be years before I learned that females possessed the only organ in the human body with no function than to feel pleasure. (If such an organ were unique to the male body, can you imagine how much we would hear about it—and what it would be used to justify?)”

“I bet you're worried. I was worried. I was worried about vaginas. I was worried about what we think about vaginas, and even more worried that we don't think about them.”

“I was worried about my own vagina. It needed a context of other vaginas-- a community, a culture of vaginas. There's so much darkness and secrecy surrounding them-- like the Bermunda Triangle.”

“It's a totally ridiculous, completely unsexy word. If you use it during sex, trying to be politically correct-- "Darling, could you stroke my vagina?"-- you kill the act right there. I'm worried about vaginas, what we call them and don't call them.”

“To love women, to love our vaginas, to know them and touch them and be familiar with who we are and what we need. To satisfy ourselves, to teach our lovers to satisfy us, to be present in our vaginas, to speak of them out loud, to speak of their hunger and pain and loneliness and humor, to make them visible so they cannot be ravaged in the dark without great consequence, so that our center, our point, our motor, our dream, is no longer detached, mutilated, numb, broken, invisible, or ashamed.”

“The African specialist Nahid Toubia puts it plain [when speaking of female genital mutilation]: In a man it would range from amoutation of most of the penis, to "removal of all the penis, its roots of soft tissue and part of the scrotal skin.”