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This book is about the relationship between emergencies and the spectator. In the early twenty-first century, ‘emergencies’ are commonplace in the newsgathering and political institutions of western industrial democracies. From terrorism to global warming, the refugee crisis to general elections, the spectator is bombarded with narratives that seek to suspend the criteria of everyday life in order to address perpetual ‘exceptional’ threats. I argue that repeated exposure to these narratives through the apparatuses of contemporary technology creates a ‘precarious spectatorship’, where the spectator’s ability to rationalise herself, or her relationship with the object of her spectatorship, is compromised. In terms of the ways in which emergencies are dramatized for the spectator, this book focuses primarily on the framing and distribution of images. Because images are cheap and easy to produce; because they can be quickly and limitlessly distributed; because they are instantly affective and because they can be easily overwritten, they have become a pre-eminent tool in the performance of emergencies. In response to this, the book proposes theatrical performance as a space in which the relationship between the spectator and emergencies may be critically examined, and I analyse a range of contemporary theatrical pieces which challenge the spectator under the aegis of emergencies.

This book examines the diverse ways in which classical myth narratives have been reworked by women playwrights for the European stage. An in-depth assessment of ‘re-vision’ as a phenomenon in women's drama, it explores the ideological and aesthetic potential of such practice and simultaneously exposes the tensions inherent in attempts to challenge narratives that have fundamentally shaped western thought. The book examines plays from the 1960s to the twenty-first century, providing contextualised readings of fourteen theatrical works originating from France, Italy, Germany, Iceland, the Netherlands, the UK and Ireland. It introduces contemporary playwrights to English-speaking readers and audiences, placing them and their works into dialogue with others more widely known. From tracing the persistence of classical myths in contemporary culture and the significance of this in shaping gendered identities and opportunities, through to analysis of individual plays and productions, the book reveals how myths have served in the theatre as ‘pretexts’ for ideological debate and have enabled exploration of the fragile borders between mythic and the everyday, and how revision has been regarded, not unproblematically, as a route towards restructuring the self. It also explores the intersection of re-vision within the contrasting trends of ‘in-yer face’ and post-dramatic theatre, and the unique potential for myth rewriting offered by autobiographical solo performance.

This book provides the first detailed account of the work of the Actresses' Franchise League, taking the story of the organisation further than ever before. Formulated as a historiographically innovative critical biography of the League over the fifty years of the organisation’s activities, this book invites a total reassessment of the League within both 20^th Century industry networks and accepted narratives of the development of political theatre in the UK. Making a genuine contribution to both theatre and suffrage histories, this book looks in detail at the performative propaganda of the suffrage movement and the role of feminist actresses as activists during and after the campaign for Votes for Women. It explores the extensive networks of political and theatrical activism and social campaigning through which suffragist performers, playwrights and producers shaped their careers, and reveals how determined the Actresses' Franchise League was to be visible in public space, and to create equal opportunities for women in the theatre industry. Drawing on archival material, this book shows how members and allies of the League addressed a broad range of political and social issues through their work, how they presented and represented women and womanhood, and how the organisation, formed and embedded in the Edwardian period, diversified during and after the First and Second World Wars.

This book challenges the traditional boundaries that have separated the histories of the first actresses and the early female playwright, bringing the approaches of new histories and historiography to bear on old stories to make alternative connections between women working in the business of theatre. Drawing from feminist cultural materialist theories and historiographies, it analyses the collaboration between the actresses Elizabeth Barry and Anne Bracegirdle and women playwrights such as Aphra Behn and Mary Pix, tracing a line of influence from the time of the first theatres royal to the rebellion that resulted in the creation of a players' co-operative. This is a story about public and private identity fuelling profit at the box office and gossip on the streets, investigating how women's on- and off-stage personae fed each other in the emerging commercial world of the business of theatre. Employing the narrative strategy of the micro-history, it offers a fresh approach to the history of women, seeing their neglected plays in the context of performance. Competition with the patent house resulted in a dirty tricks campaign that saw William Congreve supporting the female rebels or, as this book suggests, being supported by them. By combining detailed analysis of selected plays within the broader context of a playhouse managed by its leading actresses, the book challenges the received historical and literary canons, including a radical solution to the mysterious identity of the anonymous playwright ‘Ariadne’. It is a story of female collaboration and influence.

Victorian touring actresses: Crossing boundaries and negotiating the cultural landscape provides a new perspective on the on- and offstage lives of women working in nineteenth-century theatre, and affirms the central role of touring, both within the United Kingdom and in North America and Australasia. Drawing on extensive archival research, it features a cross-section of neglected performers whose dramatic specialisms range from tragedy to burlesque. Although they were employed as stars in their own time, their contribution to the industry has largely been forgotten. The book’s innovative organisation follows a natural lifecycle, enabling a detailed examination of the practical challenges and opportunities typically encountered by the actress at each stage of her working life. Individual experiences are scrutinised to highlight the career implications of strategies adopted to cope with the demands of the profession, the physical potential of the actress’s body, and the operation of gendered power on and offstage. Analysis is situated in a wide contextual framework and reveals how reception and success depended on the performer’s response to the changing political, economic, social and cultural landscape as well as to developments in professional practice and organisation. The book concludes with discussion of the legacies of the performers, linking their experiences to the present-day situation.

Since the early 2000s, Russia’s most innovative theatre artists have increasingly taken to incorporating material from real-life events into their performance practice. As the Kremlin’s crackdown on freedom of expression continues to tighten, playwrights and directors are using documentary theatre to create space for public discussion of injustice in the civic sphere and its connections to the country’s twentieth-century past. This book traces the history of documentary theatre’s remarkable growth in Russia since its inception in 1999 and situates the form’s impact within the sociopolitical setting of the Putin years (2000–). It argues that through the practice of performing documents, Russia’s theatre artists are creating a new type of cultural and historical archive that challenges the dominance of state-sponsored media and invites individuals to participate in a collective renegotiation of cultural narratives. Drawing on the author’s previous work as a researcher, producer, and performer of documentary theatre in contemporary Russia, Witness Onstage offers original insight into the nature of the exchange between audience and performance as well as new perspectives on the efficacy of theatre as a venue for civic engagement.