An evening of re-imagining with Emilias by Emilie Collyer
Emilia enters from the audience. As does the second Emilia, and the third Emilia and then the whole ensemble of actors. A simple but profound gesture that says: this story comes from you, from us. From the voices and bodies that have for so long been watching from the dark. From people who didn’t get to be in the spotlight. It is one of many such moments that occur during this production, directed by Petra Kalive. Those theatrical gestures that feel simple but come from years of experience, understanding the relationship between actors and audience, actors and text, text and space.
The play is Emilia by UK playwright Morgan Lloyd Malcom, inspired by the life of 17th Century poet Emilia Bassano. Emilia 3 (Lisa Maza) speaks first. She reads from a book, various ways in which Emilia Bassano has been described. Words rain down into the audience, ones that most women will be familiar with. Words that dismiss, belittle and demean, that make assumptions based on gender. Eventually Emilia 3 tosses the book away in disgust. Now is the time, she says, to listen. The play and the production set up the promise of hearing history told anew. I am struck by the casting choice for Lisa Maza to open the show. She also has the final, searing, soaring words. The play, while focussing mostly on the silencing of women, also speaks to other oppressions including racism and the impacts of colonisation. To sit in one of this city’s (Naarm/Melbourne) most opulent theatres (The Playhouse at Arts Centre Melbourne) in the colony of Australia and have Meriam/Yidindji/Dutch actor Maza deliver text about it being time to listen, time for new stories to be told, is extraordinarily powerful.
The conceit of the three Emilias at three different stages of life: youth (Emilia 1 played by Manali Datar); adulthood (Emilia 2 played by Cessalee Stovall) and older woman ties the play together and is the main non-naturalistic element of the script. All three Emilias are nearly always on stage. The presence of the older Emilias initially watching over the younger one and then the transition moments as each ‘takes up’ the narrative work beautifully. There is a sense here of the ways in which we are all several people throughout our lives. But also – another one of those simple yet powerful theatrical gestures – that this story is being told from and for the many, not the standard singular, individual narrative we are accustomed to in most plays. Emilia has many bodies, many selves. She is on stage, she is watching and being watched. She is in the audience, watching and being watched. She, they, we, are given space to utter and narrate, to tell her, our stories anew.
Other than the Emilias, who only play themselves, the rest of the thirteen-strong ensemble play multiple roles. This fact in itself – thirteen women and non-binary performers filling up the stage – is thrilling and heartening to witness. The actors bring verve, wit and skill to their roles and to telling this story. The joy and bond between them is palpable. The deft hands of director Kalive and movement director Xanthe Beesley are apparent, from the specifically choregraphed dance sequences through to a cleverly executed birth scene, Emilia’s movement throughout her life and throughout the city of London and a stunning, deeply moving tableaux of grief towards the end of the play. Costumes (by Zoë Rouse) are bright and speak both to the Elizabethan era and to today, with many of the actors wearing runners. Another small, smart gesture that serves to intervene in history, to invite the audience to re-think and reimagine. What if women were, and had always been, free to run wherever they pleased, in comfortable footwear! Emily Collett’s set design centres around moveable ladder structure which serves to evoke both social hierarchy and adaptability. In a powerful moment at the end of Act 1, a curtain drops and is then gathered and folded at the start of Act 2, as if to indicate a putting away of a certain version of history, a folding of the past. Lighting (Katie Sfetkidis and associate Harry Hogan) plays a key role to keep the story and world dynamic, and composition and sound (Emah Fox and Sharyn Brand) provides shifts in atmosphere from the celebratory dance numbers through to quiet moments of pathos and grief.
The script traverses a huge amount of material, aiming to cover Emilia’s life from childhood to her seventies. I am aware that some of the play is based in fact, some takes creative license and there are moments of clear, contemporary commentary such as a moment in Emilia’s early life at court where she is grilled by the other young women asking: ‘Where are you from? No, where are you REALLY from?’ in echoes of the kind of exhausting questioning people of colour put up with in white dominant cultures such as Australia.
The central fact that Emilia Bassano is most ‘famous’ for is her relationship with William Shakespeare. The suggestion that she was not only his muse, but also perhaps wrote large sections of poetry, or suggested story lines that he used in his sonnets and plays. This element of the play reminds me of the television series Upstart Crow, a comedy about Shakespeare by Ben Elton starring David Mitchell as an arrogant, buffoon-like (but ultimately lovable) character. In that series, the suggestion is that Will’s wife Anne Hathaway came up with a lot of ideas for his plays.
Probing and deconstructing the massive myth of male genius that surrounds Shakespeare (and a multitude of other artists) is rich fodder. It is handled in an interesting, if not entirely satisfying way in Emilia. But the ‘unsatisfying’ quality is something of note to consider. While this aspect of Emilia’s narrative is key to the play, it is not absolutely central. We meet Will Shakespeare, but he actually doesn’t get a whole lot of stage time. He is played, in this production, by Heidi Arena and she plays him with a light touch. He is present. He is important. But he is played as just one character (albeit a very significant one) in Emilia’s life, not as a main character around which her story is told. I could imagine a version of this story, this relationship, that could be much more deeply investigated, that could be a whole play or indeed novel, or television series. But the choice here, by playwright Lloyd Malcolm and by Kalive and Arena in how Will is ‘managed’ in the story and on stage, is to restrict the voice and presence of this overwhelming historical figure. To let him be smaller. To tell something of this aspect of history anew.
The question of scale is present through the play. At times, I was keen for deeper dives into relationships and moments. There are so many fascinating tensions and connections to explore. From Emilia’s court relationship with Lord Henry Carey (played with superb ‘masterful benevolence by Genevieve Picot), to her strained yet strangely convivial marriage of convenience to the presumably gay Lord Alphonso Lanier (a beautifully poignant scene about this where Emilia observes they are both ‘out of time’ and Lanier, played with a lovely low-key foppishness by Catherine Glavicic brushes off the suggestion, not ready to acknowledge his ‘reality’, is a highlight of the play), and her strong bond with Lady Margaret Clifford (played with authoritative gravitas by Emma J Hawkins). There is simply not scope in a play of this length to ‘cover’ a whole life and also provide detailed and gritty nuance for each character and relationship. The choice by Lloyd Malcolm is to go for breadth rather than depth. The politics of the play speak to multiplicity and ensemble. Emilia has an impact on and is impacted by the groups of women she encounters; the ladies of court and then the working-class women she befriends, teaches and encourages to read, learn and write.
Facts mix with fiction as a portrait of one person, of many people, of a time in history, is evoked over the few hours of the play. I am struck by the sense of a woman who lived a full life. The Emilia / Emilias we meet integrate family heritage (coming from a legacy of court musicians), the family’s need for income, role as court mistress, as mother, as wife, as writer, muse, teacher, published poet, agitator and activist. Polemical speeches are mixed with naturalistic dialogue, moments of actual Shakespearian (Bassanian?) poetry, and philosophical musings. We see communities of vibrant, funny, raucous, smart, women. They are not abject or small. There are moments of gendered violence, oppression and the climax of the play is tragic as a key character is punished for her voice, her poetry, for speaking out. This moment pulses throughout the audience, leaving us quietly recognising the real consequences that are still suffered by so many women. I am reminded of the recent death in Iran of Mahsa Amini, punished for violating the country’s dress code. The final, raging monologue delivered by Maza, saying, she, they, Emilia hold the muscle memory of all women before and will send it forth to all women to come, provokes a standing ovation.
It is fascinating to experience this work in this venue. The production has a very ‘indie’ feel. It is a collaboration between Arts Centre Melbourne, Geelong Arts Centre and renowned local independent company Essential Theatre. Restrictions such as budget, that would not normally be visible at The Playhouse but are part and parcel of independent theatre, create a rippling tension and speak to the themes of the play. Who gets to tell stories, even today, in funded, approved, sanctioned spaces? Whose voices are not usually heard and what does it feel like to present a ‘poor theatre’ (politically, aesthetically) production in a ‘rich theatre’ place?
The audience, too, seems to be a real mix. I recognise many peers, theatre makers and independent practitioners. As well as those who ‘look like’ more regular Arts Centre attendees, or tourists (overhearing some people speak). Two women take a selfie before the show begins, clearly excited to be at theatre and they are two who jump up immediately, standing and applauding at the end of the show. My sense is that for some in the audience, the ideas of the play are new, even radical. This reminds me that while feminist and other movements of resistance including decolonisation have firm traction and shared understandings in some parts of the arts sector, for others there remains an urgent need to keep airing and sharing, deconstructing and making anew.
My evening, our evening with Emilias contributes to this sharing in a vital way. Adding one more act of re-thinking, re-imagining, re-listening.
Emilie Collyer