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  • News
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    • Different Stages project
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    • Blog
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Naomi Paxton - Researcher and Performer

Suffrage on stage - 2008-2018

20/7/2017

11 Comments

 
I wrote a blog post about suffrage plays for the Vote 100 project - you can read it here. Whilst doing it, I began to compile a list of all the professional performances of suffrage plays, old and new, since 2008... and I'd like you to check yours or one you attended or one that you are putting on next year is on the list, and if not, comment on this post so I can add it to the list! 

I am including:
  • Professional productions of plays written by suffragist writers that feature suffrage as a theme or were performed for suffragist audiences between 1908-1918
  • New written and/or devised work based on the lives of individual suffragists or suffragettes, female or male
  • New written and/or devised work based on suffrage plays, novels or songs
  • Site-specific performances featuring or highlighting suffragists and suffragettes
  • Performative commemorations or celebrations of suffragists and suffragettes
  • Filmed performances of any of the above
  • Interactive and immersive performances of any of the above
  • Applied theatre/community based projects about suffrage that lead to a public performance
  • Upcoming performances of new or existing work in 2017 and 2018
  • Anything else that I've missed out here but that you think should be included!

At the moment I am not including projects or performances that have only taken place in formal education institutions, so schools, colleges and universities... unless those performances were/are open to the public or are made available to the public online through video, audio or other online dissemination.

​Please don't be cross if yours is not there - comment and I will add it to the list. This first list is purely made up of projects and performances I remember being in, putting on, attending or knowing about so is limited by those factors.

Please
 comment and let's make it a much better and more inclusive and more extensive list!

Here's the list so far - arranged by year at the moment:
2008

Actresses' Franchise League readings, Novello Theatre
Her Naked Skin by Rebecca Lenkiewicz, National Theatre
Suffragettes: 100 years, Orange Tree Theatre
2009

Actresses' Franchise League readings, Prince of Wales Theatre 
2010

Knickerbocker Glories at the Union Theatre,
 The Milliner and the Weaver by Marie Jones, part of Women, Power and Politics, Tricycle Theatre
2011

​A Pageant of Great Women,
 presented by Fragments and Monuments at the University of Hull

2012
???
2013

Emily: The Making of A Militant Suffragette, Cambridge Devised Theatre (also 2014), tour
Muriel Matters, Sonia Bible, film

Oxygen, Dreadnought South West, tour
To Hear Her Voice, Clare Neylon, film

To Freedom’s Cause by Kate Willoughby, tour
Pageant of Great Women, YouTube

Stage Rights, A Living Literature Walk, Scary Little Girls, London
Suffragettes on Stage, National Theatre
Up The Women, Series One, BBC
2014

CauseWay, Robert Burns Birthplace Museum and Cottage
Fight for the Right: the Birmingham Suffragettes by Sima Gonsai, short film  

Paper Dolls by A Cat and Mouse Act, London
The First Actress, Palindrome Productions, London
​To Freedom’s Cause by Kate Willoughby, House of Commons

2015

Suffrage stories, Pankhurst centre, Wonder Women, Manchester
Suffragette, Film
The Anti-Suffragist or The Other Side, YouTube
The Hard Way Up – A Suffragette’s Story, Wonder Women, Manchester
The Orchard, Dreadnought South West
Up The Women, Series Two, BBC​
Votes for Women, BBC Radio 3
​Women at Rada, Bloomsbury Festival, Conway Hall

2016

A Particular Theatre: Shakespeare, Suffragists and Soldiers, Being Human Festival, London
Change, Acting Coach Scotland, Edinburgh Fringe
Freedom for Women is Not a Crime, Trowbridge Town Hall 
Lady Connie and the Suffragettes, Cambridge Devised Theatre, tour
March of Women by Fragments and Monuments, Glasgow
Resurrecting the Shakespeare Hut, Digital Drama, London
Shoulder to Shoulder by Nimble Troop Productions, London
Stage Rights, A Living Literature Walk, Scary Little Girls, London​
2017

Everything is Possible, York Theatre Royal
Deeds not Words, a Hebridean suffragette play ​by Toria Banks, Rural Nations Scotland CIC
Deeds Not Words; Endell Street Military Hospital, Digital Drama, London
Just to Get Married, Papercut Theatre and Finborough Theatre
Princess Suffragette, London Grey and Green Theatre Company
 Sylvia by Lynx Theatre and Poetry
Woman on Fire, Certain Curtain, Edinburgh Fringe
Women, the West End and the Western Front, Being Human Festival, London

2018

​The Orchard, Dreadnought South West
[Title tbc], Mikron Theatre​
11 Comments
Anna Andes
20/7/2017 07:57:45 pm

Linda Griffiths' Age of Arousal written in 2004 has had various productions post 2008. Not sure if in U.K. but definitely in Canada. Griffiths was Canadian. One of the lead characters is a retired militant suffragette and lesbian.

Reply
Anna Birch link
21/7/2017 03:30:10 pm

Hi Naomi

This list is useful and so very interesting!

I will send a some more detail over on Monday, all best Anna

Reply
Katharine Cockin
21/7/2017 09:36:18 pm

Dear Naomi

Great list!

Can you add 'Suffragettes' performed by Hull College Students, Middleton Hall, University of Hull, 11 May 2011? This preceded the production of A Pageant of Great Women at Middleton Hall, University of Hull. Both productions were open to the public and A Pageant of Great Women involved members of the public/audience taking part in the play. The event programme is archived here:

https://hydra.hull.ac.uk/resources/hull:10738

Also, Anna Birch directed Hrotsvit, Paphnutius, staged reading (open to the public) and recorded; archived online: https://hydra.hull.ac.uk/resources/hull:8562

As above, audience discussion after the staged reading:
https://hydra.hull.ac.uk/resources/hull:8563

It would be really useful to have the precise dates, venues and directors/companies.

Reply
Frances Babbage
24/7/2017 08:44:07 am

Really useful list! Thanks for compiling it. You can also add Red Ladder's "Wrong 'Un" (2013-16):

http://www.redladder.co.uk/whats-on/past-shows/

Best
Frances

Reply
Anna Birch link
24/7/2017 10:43:35 am

As promised Naomi:

Professor Anna Birch,
Artistic Director Fragments & Monuments performance and film company
www.fragmentsandmonuments.com Twitter: @anna_birch1 #marchofwomen

August 2015 MARCH: A Glasgow Women's Library and Royal Conservatoire of Scotland Film

'MARCH' documents a large scale, public art event March of Women taking to the streets of Bridgeton on the eve of International Women's Day 2015.

Taking Cicely Hamilton's popular suffragette play 'A Pageant of Great Women', as a starting point the diverse community of women in Glasgow in 2015 is bought to the screen.

Through a series of interviews with a wide variety of women taking part in the performance and march, the film considers the gap in documenting women's history, and points to the resounding importance of having a female generation to both honour and draw inspiration from. It follows the process of the plays development within a community of Scottish women from boat builders, to students, librarians and politicians, as they work together towards the final event on March 7 2015. The film gives a lingering insight into some of political and social experiences of women in Scotland today, and invites testament to the tremendous power of a collective voice, and the surprising resonance of a play written over a century ago with our contemporary society.

Running Time tbc (40 mins)
Film-maker: Marissa Keating
Artistic Director Anna Birch
DVD Screener Available from Glasgow Women's Library
Subtitled by Stagetext www.stagetext.org
www.fragmentsandmonuments.com

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwH_fA5e64I&feature=youtu.be

http://womenslibrary.org.uk/discover-our-projects/march-of-women/

March 7 2015: March of Women, Directed by Anna Birch in partnership with Glasgow Women’s Library and the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, Glasgow, UK, Glasgow Women’s Library and Glasgow Green, open to the public and including participation by the public

May 31 2014 Pahnutius by Hrotsvit, recorded staged reading (translated by Christopher St John, originally directed by Edith Craig) Directed by Anna Birch held as part of an interdisciplinary international symposium on the playwright, University of Hull to mark the centenary of a 1914 production by the Pioneer Players to continue The Pioneer Players research network collaboration https://hydra.hull.ac.uk/resources/hull:8562

2012: A Pageant of Great Women DVD, Directed by Anna Birch produced by Fragments & Monuments www.fragmentsandmonuments.com, ISBN 978-0-9568008-1-7 Centenary conference Pageants and Pioneers marking the founding of The Pioneer Players theatre society convened by Professor Katharine Cockin, University of Hull, UK https://vimeo.com/99813842

Saturday 7 May 2011: A Pageant of Great Women by Cicely Hamilton, Directed by Anna Birch, produced by Fragments & Monuments www.fragmentsandmonuments.com, Centenary conference: Pageants and Pioneers
marking the founding of The Pioneer Players theatre society, convened by Professor Katharine Cockin, Middleton Hall, University of Hull, UK open to the public and including participation by the public
Event programme: https://hydra.hull.ac.uk/resources/hull:10738

Reply
Anna Birch link
24/7/2017 10:55:35 am

A new one for the list Naomi:
Deeds not Words by Toria Banks
Director Muriel Ann Macleod
Dramaturg Anna Birch
Produced by Rural Nations Scotland CICI, opens August 24-26th, An Lanntair Arts Centre, Stornaway followed by Outer Hebrides tour
https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/deeds-not-words-a-hebridean-womens-play

all best Anna

Reply
Jonathan Edgington link
24/7/2017 01:44:41 pm

Hi Naomi - this probably doesn't qualify as it hasn't yet had a full professional performance but I have a new one act, suffragette/world war one themed play GENDER FLUID (two scenes from which were workshopped at the Old Vic Workrooms by Scene Gym/Old Vic New Voices earlier this year). More details of + an extract from GENDER FLUID can be read here:

http://www.smithscripts.co.uk/project/gender-fluid-by-jonathan-edgington/

Best Wishes,

Jonathan

Reply
Lucy Stevens link
24/7/2017 03:42:25 pm


Ethel Smyth – Grasp the Nettle

A new one woman play with music
performed by Lucy Stevens and pianist Elizabeth Marcus.

To celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Representation of the People Act 1918, the decisive step in the political emancipation of women in the UK. A whirlwind of Ethel’s exploits and passions interwoven with her songs, the story of her greatest opera, ‘The Wreckers’ and her battle for an equal voice.

Confirmed performances in 2018 are at Redbridge Drama Centre, Tour of Penzance, The Sandstone Festival, Hitchin Festival and Milton Court Concert Hall, Barbican.

Reply
Nicola Gauld
27/7/2017 01:01:50 pm

Hi Naomi,

Not sure if this is what you're looking for but we made a historical re-enactment film as part of the Fight for the Right project in 2013.
You can see the film here:
https://vimeo.com/86719388

Nicola

Reply
Clive jones
28/7/2019 12:56:10 pm

What about the suffragette dancers on stage at the Empire Theatre in London in 1913

Reply
Howard L link
1/12/2020 08:43:43 am

Lovely blog you have here

Reply



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