by The game of April de Angelis from 1993 is more of a snapshot than a colorful portrait of the first cohort of women who have to be allowed on the stage. Nevertheless, it is an entertaining and revealing ensemble work that captures the delicate moment in the stage history of the 17th century when these groundbreaking women span the authorization and economic independence with sexual objectification and hostile moral judgment.
Nell Gwyn, played by Zoe Brough, is famous that they belong to these early actresses, but de Angelis draws on and outside the stage several other stories and five lives together. There is Ms. Betterton (Anna Chancellor, who gives a glossy performance), something like a eldest that supports stage surfaces and technology. Mrs. Marshall (Katherine Kingsley), a kind of steels whose earlier affair with an earl has susceptible to rearling and attack; Ms. Farley (Nicole Sawyerr), who starts in front of the stage as a soapbox Christian; And finally Doll (Doña Croll) who supports her.
Michael Oakley’s production leads you to live with charm and business while talking about your work, love and dreams, as well as the work staged by the king’s company: The Scottish Play, Othello The Moor and “Hamlet the Ditherer”. They carry out shows of shows in front of the invisible audience of the 1660s and it is a mixed bag from Cleopatra to Amazonians, which sometimes leans into sexualized stereotypes with Archness. It is in the backstage drama that they are brought to life the strongest – although their interpersonal stories are pulled with fairly too light touch.
There is camaraderie, trust and competition – the competition between Gwyn and Farley, who for the first time attract the king’s eye before turning his attention to Gwyn. A large number of topics are covered by Agesmus in the theater society and among the actors themselves to the random pregnancies that these women can force off the stage.
The stories are always convincing, but only low, and the characterization is wide. But the actors raise it and bring a warm, lively comedy. The stage design of Fotini Dimou is also a light, easy touch and works well in this room, whereby the candlelight reduces or increases to mean when the women are on or off the stage, and a feeling of glitter and glamor conjured up by costumes and confetti.
This is a piece that exudes a love of trade, from sawing to the stars and as a memory of a turning point in theater history, when these women were also seen as pioneers, renegades and curiosities that resembled dancing bears.
• In the Orange Tree Theater, London, until April 12th
