Exchange Talk: Behind the Arts – Challenging Gender Ideas on Stage: A Panel Discussion

Behind the Arts – Challenging Gender Ideas on Stage: a panel discussion

Join members of the BA Acting, BA Performance, and BA Musical Theatre cohorts and a panel of theatre artists to discuss themes from four exciting drama productions spanning the Autumn/Winter season.

These four shows span hundreds of years, multiple performance styles, and draw from source material including true crime, film, musical, historical figure, and the novel. Though their protagonists vary hugely, this collection of characters all rebel against the gender related expectations placed upon them. This panel discussion reflects on how these stories challenge notions of gender, and what wider questions we can ask about gender representation on stage now.

Part of Exchange Talks, Behind the Arts is a curated series of talks and discussions which explore performances at RCS. Open to everyone, these events are a chance to find out more about how performances are made and the themes they explore.

The Productions:

Machinal by Sophie Treadwell explores a 1920s true crime story. Character Helen Jones is lonely in her marriage and motherhood. Overwhelmed by society and the machinery of life, she commits a crime to escape it, ultimately leading to her downfall.

Based on Dolly Parton and Patricia Resnick’s much-loved 1980’s film of the same name, 9 to 5 celebrates courage, sisterhood, and standing up for what you believe in, when Violet, Judy and Doralee take on their sexist boss. These three women tirelessly attempt to fill their cup of ambition in a world that keeps pushing them back.

Charlie Josephine reimagines 15th century Joan of Arc in I, Joan. Against the backdrop of an endless, patriarchal war, an unlikely leader emerges from the margins. Young, poor, and refusing to be constrained by gender, Joan finds a fierce inner power that ignites a rebellion. A joyous, queer and deeply hopeful celebration of identity and courage.

In Orlando, Neil Barlett brings us a time-travelling, century-hopping gleeful adventure through English history based of Virginia Woolf’s book. Orlando’s story is repeatedly ‘reborn’ as it plays with gender, society’s rules and how we are supposed to present and love.