Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario — No one rescues Bella Manningham. And that’s a good thing.
Bella, the seemingly self-harming maiden at the heart of Gaslight, has been a source of compassion among theater and film audiences for over 80 years.However, this year’s 1938 Patrick Hamilton soap opera was set by Jonna Wright and Patty Jamison in 1880. Show festivalThey imagined that the fate of the heroine would be very different.
“We didn’t want to change the rules of Victorian society and how it affected women,” Wright said. “Our question is, is there a way for her to play and win according to these rules?”
And they embarked on an ambitious restart of the play, maintaining the eerie setting (Victorian living room) and basic assumptions (Is Bella losing her mind?). Abandoned one major character. Detective Rough, Canny Inspector, who sets everything straight and explains it all to poor, poor Bella, is gone. The result was a full overhaul, a nifty Act I curtain, and the crowd spilled into the lobby, splattering, “What should she do now?”
“Gaslite” director Kerry Fox said these choking rules weren’t limited to what he did on stage. “I think this play was originally written for an audience who still expects a modest version of femininity,” she said. “They wanted a story about a male hero coming to the rescue.”
To some extent, current events have made “Gaslite” more topical, but more predictable. The title itself shows how much trust the audience should have in Bella’s always begging husband, Jack. In fact, the term “gaslight” comes from the term psychologically manipulating people to question their sanity. In this play, the night when Bella is alone, the gas lights in her home flicker and dim, making her doubt her sanity.
This concept has existed in psychology for decades, but in recent years it has only permeated mainstream societies, and in 2016 the American Dialect Society called it “most useful / likely to succeed.” I praised it.
“The strange thing is that I started writing this before’gaslights’ became a big topic in the news. Maybe I felt it coming.”
In her review of the Toronto Star’s play, Karen Fricker called it “a very satisfying piece of theater reinvention,” and the audience “brought a wise friend to the show and went through what happened. Share the fun of researching and grabbing clues. ” Looking back, it’s proof. “
“Gas light” Is one of the few shows festival plays in this idyllic town 20 miles north of Niagara Falls in honor of the Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw, and this year’s gender and femininity. Working on the idea.
The Royal George Theater also has a one-act play of Rabindranath Tagore. “Chitra” Based on the story of the Sanskrit epic Mahabharata, it is about a warrior princess who temporarily abandons her “masculine” tendency to attract world-famous shooters. And next month, the festival will be expanded to a complete 11-show repertoire, including one of Wilson’s century cycle plays in August, The Jewel of the Sea. After that, all three works will be performed until early October.
For Kimberly Lampersad, who both directed and choreographed “Chitra,” the 1892 play (translated from the original Sanskrit to English in 1913) naturally adapted to the festival. Through their words, “she said. But it also reminds us that such fits can be found outside the western canon. “I chose this not to be rude, but to prove the point,” she said.
Chitra’s gender fluidity has resonated with Lampersad since she was young. She said, “My parents call me their” boy’s child. ” Lampelsad, a type of fast-paced cross-casting often seen at show festivals, plays the decisive and forever feminine Laura in Damn Yankees, which also starred Jamison, co-author of Gaslight. .. )
Regarding “Gas Wright,” Jamieson and Wright initially said they planned to diverge from Hamilton’s play here and there, but soon they needed to have their gut refurbished to tell the story they wanted to tell. I noticed. “I don’t know if our version still has the original dialogue,” Wright said.
Another change included adding shadows of good and evil between the female characters in the play. One of the daily stresses Bella faces is the “new girl.” The housekeeper is at least indifferent and lazy, and probably a little bad.
“It’s pretty boring to make this just a fight between men and women,” Wright said.
The battle was at the heart of several works by the show, considered the first major playwright to portray what became known as the new woman. (Lampersad said his first exposure to his work came from reading “The Occupation of Mrs. Warren,” who has a sympathetic view of sex work. She said, “A man wrote this. I remember thinking, “Are you?”
Many things were made from the evolving “mandate” of the show festival. This is a work originally written during his (usefully long) life, limiting his repertoire to shows. The mission was then extended to new works set during the show’s life, and then re-growth to include essentially all the plays that the show might have liked.
It happens that both “Chitra” and “Gaslight” are modified with the original parameters. (The show died in 1950.) However, Fox, who had played an ensemble at the show festival for many years before shifting his focus to the director, suffered from the many roles she was offered here and elsewhere. I remember feeling that. She said, “I once said in my mid-30s.’Now I want to stop playing naive kids. Can I be a woman?”
It happened that one such part was there. It hasn’t been rewritten yet.
