The Kirkwood Theatre put on a play entitled Vinegar Tom. Using Aristotle six elements to discuss this play, we will begin with the plot. The play is set in the 1600 during the Salem witch trials. In the beginning of the play we are introduced to one of the main characters named Alice. We are also introduced to a man with no name, who kept on insisting that he was the devil. We no long see that man, but the fact that Alice slept with the “devil will be brought up a lot and will lead to the death of her. The story mainly focuses on Alice and her mother Joan, who are the first people in the story accused to be witches. The story has underlining tones of the feminist agenda and uses this story to explain all the things that were happening to women during the feminist movement. The characters in the story were Alice, Joan, Susan, Goody, Betty, Margery, Cunning women, Jack, and Packer. The …show more content…
We were really close to the actors so we didn’t have to fully rely on the emotion in their voice, because we could see their face. The lighting was dark most of the time, but when one character was announcing something important the spotlight would shine on them. The cast also didn’t wear any shoes. Most of the characters weren’t that finically well off and couldn’t afford shoes. Great detail that was added in this story. There is also a lack of music. Music helps you feel what the writer or director wants you to feel, but I think in this play, the control was given to the audience. There were only two times music was used in the play and it was during the trails of the “witches”, it stopped when they were hung and also at the end when Alice and Susan were removing the noose off of Joan and the Cunning women. They didn’t use a big cast for this play, they had about 8 or 9 cast members. A few of them would play another character. I’m not sure as to why this was done, but it could be, because of the small space that was on the
Pitt, Angela. "Women in Shakespeare's Tragedies." Readings on The Tragedies. Ed. Clarice Swisher. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 1996. Reprint of Shakespeare's Women. N.p.: n.p., 1981.
Although Aristotle's tragic hero would be a character in a high social or political standing, Arthur Miller portrays John Proctor as a common farmer that is honest and living a respectable life in a Puritan town with a wife and three children. However, as the play opens, the audience discovers that Proctor has a significant secret, which was his affair with a young girl named Abigail Williams. Abigail doesn't want to believe that it is over between her and John and tries to kill Elizabeth Proctor by engaging in witchcraft with a few other girls in the town. As the town uncovers the antics of the girls and are outraged, the girls start to cry out names of others they have supposedly seen with the Devil in order to save themselves. Therefore, the audience perceives that the affair between John and Abigail is the instigator of all the hysteria surrounding the witch trials, signifying the consequences of a small human error.
The acting in the play was superb. Honestly everyone did an excellent job. Kody Grassett’s ability to act feminine like Mother Superior was amusing and realistic. Brianna Joseph’s dancing had myself laughing hysterically. Alexandra Voelmle’s portrayal of Agnes and her ability to switch from an innocent personality to her later sinful personality was impressive. The individual performances really showcased each actor’s strong suit which kept the audience intrigued the entire time. I can relate to all the characters as each one is struggling to showcase exactly how they want to be known to the
The play is based on the real life witch hunts that occurred in the late
The play opened with the girls doing something considered taboo in Puritan society, dancing in the woods. The girls involved in this were Abigail Williams, Betty Parris, Mary Warren, Ruth Putnam, and a few others. Tituba, Reverend Parris’s slave from Barbados was also with them. All of the girls involved were caught by Reverend Samuel Parris, the minister of Salem. When Reverend Parris catches the girls dancing in the woods, his daughter Betty Parris becomes ill. Abigail Williams, Parris’s niece, is questioned by Parris on what they were doing in the woods. Abigail eventually admits that they were only dancing in the woods. Abigail reveals that there are rumours in the village that witchcraft is the cause of Betty’s sickness, and Parris becomes nervous. Parris calls upon Reverend Hale, an expert on witchcraftery, to figure out what is wrong with Betty. Later, Parris asks Abigail if they were conjuring spirits in the woods and she denies it. He says that he saw Tituba chanting and that he saw someone naked. Abigail again denies that anything but dancing occurred in the woods. Next, Parris asks why Elizabeth Proctor, wife of John Proctor, fired her from her job as their maid. Abigail says that she was fired because she didn’t want to be a slave to Elizabeth and she calls Elizabeth a gossiping liar. Moments later, Mrs.Putnam enters and says that she sent Ruth Putnam to Tituba and told her to conjure dead babies in order to find out why Mrs.Putnam’s babi...
Throughout the plays, the reader can visualize how men dismiss women as trivial and treat them like property, even though the lifestyles they are living in are very much in contrast. The playwrights, each in their own way, are addressing the issues that have negatively impacted the identity of women in society.
One of the most prominent themes in Arthur Miller’s 1953 drama, The Crucible, is the use of role reversals within race and gender boundaries, social status, and superficial power. In the not-so-sleepy town of Salem, Massachusetts, the rumor of witches among the community runs rampant as various characters work to accuse their fellow citizens of witchery or defend their neighbors from the gallows. Driven by jealously and pure hatred, those who have minor roles within the community lust after a more notable place in society by accusing the more distinguished members to rid them of their land, wealth, or reputation – and even their life. Those wrongfully accused are driven by fear as they either admit their guilt to save their own lives or find someone else to blame for the supposed crime. In turn, this causes the well-known citizens to be reduced to their salt and the minor townsfolk to gain a certain type of fame or air about themselves. The turn of tables proves to benefit certain female characters with minor roles and damage the more notable male characters within the community.
In the play the crucible by Arthur Miller people are faced with an issue believed to be witchcraft. The play is based upon a problem that happened in 1692 and 1693 in Massachusetts. In the play people believe that everything that goes wrong must be related to witchcraft. If accused of witch craft you will be arrested and forced to a trial. In the play the trial is influenced on a girl named Abigale who holds the power to tell if a person is working with the devil. As the play progresses girls from the town fake illnesses, accuse people, and support Abigale decisions willingly with no disregard. The girls blindly follow Abigail scheme because if they go against her she will accuse them of witchcraft and will be sent to death.
Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible, renders the horrific events of the Salem witch trial through a crew of many fantastic characters. Fear pedals the citizens of Salem Massachusetts to reveal their true character while facing the judgment of a bias court before barbarous judges. While the whole town of Salem is filled up with this madness, two particular women stand out above the rest. Shame and revenge lives in the mind and heart of an adulteress teenager Abigail Williams, while truth and righteousness lives in the soul of Elizabeth Proctor, a faithful wife to John Proctor. Abigail and Elizabeth both heighten the suspense and tension of the play along with their differences leading to turmoil due to both of their desire for one man’s love.
There are few characters in this story, but they all play an important part. The characters are Mrs. Mallard, Josephine, Richards, and Brently Mallard. Mrs. Mallard and Brently Mallard are married and live together in the house that the story takes place in. Josephine is Mrs. Mallard’s sister and she is the one who would break the news to her about Brently Mallards death in the railroad accident. Finally Richards who is Brently Mallards good friend, and he is the one who found out about Brently Mallards death.
Shakespeare’s Much Ado about Nothing is, on the surface, a typical romantic comedy with a love-plot that ends in reconciliation and marriage. This surface level conformity to the conventions of the genre, however, conceals a deeper difference that sets Much Ado apart. Unlike Shakespeare’s other romantic comedies, Much Ado about Nothing does not mask class divisions by incorporating them into an idealized community. Instead of concealing or obscuring the problem of social status, the play brings it up explicitly through a minor but important character, Margaret, Hero’s “waiting gentlewoman.” Shakespeare suggests that Margaret is an embodiment of the realistic nature of social class. Despite her ambition, she is unable to move up in hierarchy due to her identity as a maid. Her status, foiling Hero’s rich, protected upbringing, reveals that characters in the play, as well as global citizens, are ultimately oppressed by social relations and social norms despite any ambition to get out.
The play, set in the 1600’s during the witch hunt that sought to rid villages of presumed followers and bidders of the devil is a parallel story to the situation in the US in the 1950’s: McCarthyism, seeking the riddance of communist ideologists. Miller sets this story more particularly in a village called Salem, where the theocratic power governed by strict puritan rules require the people to be strong believers and forbid them to sin at risk of ending up in hell. However, the audience notices that despite this strong superficial belief in God, faith is not what truly motivates them, but it is rather money and reputation.
Since this is a review and its based on my opinion, I would have to say this was one of the worst plays I've ever seen in my life. I wasn't entertained by the play at all. The only good parts were the good-looking girls in the play. I like the main character Marisol based only on her looks. She played on ok job of acting. I realize she had a lot of lines to memorize which she had down, but she just didn't get to me. I think the costumes were ok. They had nothing special, or out of the ordinary except for the angel's wings, which were pretty nice. I didn't like the lighting or the scenery. I didn't know where the scene was supposed to be at some points.
The most successful aspect of the performance for me were the scene changes. I found that the rotation of the blackboard, center stage, where the actors were able to stoop beneath it in order to enter and exit the stage, was an effective touch to this non naturalistic performance. When this was first used, at the end of the first scene, when the characters Ruth and Al left the stage, I thought it didn't quite fit as at the beginning the style was leaning towards realism. But as the play progressed and the acting style became more and more non naturalistic, and this rotation of the black board technique was used more frequently it fitted in really well and became really effective.
William Shakespeare’s The Tempest provides dialogue that portrays the social expectations and stereotypes imposed upon women in Elizabethan times. Even though the play has only one primary female character, Miranda, the play also includes another women; Sycorax, although she does not play as large a roll. During many scenes, the play illustrates the characteristics that represent the ideal woman within Elizabethan society. These characteristics support the fact that men considered women as a mere object that they had the luxury of owning and were nowhere near equal to them. Feminists can interpret the play as a depiction of the sexist treatment of women and would disagree with many of the characteristics and expectations that make Miranda the ideal woman. From this perspective, The Tempest can be used to objectify the common expectations and treatment of women within the 16th and 17th Centuries and compare and contrast to those of today.