Berkeley’s Shotgun Players kicks off season of female playwrights
Christie Ruhl Churchill Carson Trevino Orta
Twelve plays. All women.
Berkeley’s Shotgun Players has long made its name by daring to dream big and take chances, but this season takes that vision to a whole new level. Inspired by the controversy that erupted in the theater world when Minnesota’s Guthrie Theater company announced a 2012 season that featured no women or minority playwrights, Shotgun artistic director Patrick Dooley decided to shake things up with an all- female lineup for 2015.
“When you have three little girls, you start to look at the world differently. I want them to have equal opportunity,” says Dooley. “Theater is my thing — that’s how I do my part to try and make the world a little better place. This just feels like what we should be doing.”
Twelve
Running the gamut
playwrights.
From the esoteric ( Anne Carson’s “Antigonick,” an adaptation of the tragedy “Antigone,” part of Sophocles’ trio of plays that dealt with the reign of Oedipus the King) and the historic ( Aphra Behn’s 1677 “The Rover”) to the crowd- pleasing (“The Mousetrap”), it’s a gobsmacking season that touches on a spectrum of voices. Iconic playwrights ( Caryl Churchill’s “Top Girls”) rub elbows with 21st- century darlings ( Sarah Ruhl’s “Eurydice”) and local emerging artists ( Marisela Trevino Orta’s “Heart Shaped Nebula”) in this ambitious lineup of six full productions and six staged readings. This boundary- pushing Shotgun season begins March 19 with “Antigonick” and runs through Jan uary 2016 with “The Mousetrap.”
“For 2,000 years, all the playwrights were male, so that is who is sitting on the shelf of your theater a second space in the old Serendipity Books location at 1201 University Ave., which is now part rehearsal studio and part venue for emerging artists. But it’s the all- female season, the decision to tackle the issue of representation head- on, that has generated the most buzz.
“Shotgun is known to be a company that takes big risks and that has formed its identity around the ability to do so,” notes director Barbara Damashek, “and this is certainly a marketing risk. No question.”
Some have praised the project as a bold move ; others think it’s about time.
“Isn’t it crazy that anyone would think it is brave to mount a season that is all women?” agrees Susie Medak, managing director of Berkeley Rep. “Who would ever call it brave to do a season that is all men? Rather than brave, I’d agree that it offers some opportunities for real fun and, quite possibly, a really refreshing shift in perspective.”
What about newcomers?
It should be noted that some have criticized the company for showcasing well- known women writers such as Churchill and Ruhl instead of helping discover new voices. Why not turn the spotlight on unknowns instead of famous names?
“It’s easy to wag your finger and turn up your nose,” says Dooley, who is quick to point out that Shotgun has long made new plays one of its missions. “But I love this season. I think if we are going to talk about women playwrights, these are all plays we should know and that many in my audience have not seen. I am also hoping that these are not plays where we will get mauled at the box office because the bottom line is we need to live to fight another day.”
Indeed, Dooley lost the rights to several hot, new plays he was hoping to snag for this project, but he is also at peace with the fact that doing something new always invites scrutiny.
In the past few years, Shotgun has staged some absolutely brilliant and critically acclaimed new works, such as Linda McLean’s “Strangers, Babies” and Enda Walsh’s “The New Electric Ballroom,” that have tanked at the box office. So it would not be an unwelcome turn of events if “Mousetrap” packed the house, but that is not the only reason the Agatha Christie gem is in the season.
“My grandma took me to that play when I was a little boy, and it blew my mind,” says Dooley . “I am hoping it can be a gateway play for some new audiences.”
Dooley is committed to maintaining gender parity going forward. In fact, he had initially planned to do the all- female season but not brand it that way and just let it stand on its own, but the women on his staff convinced him that it was time to engage people in a conversation about theater and gender.
“It’s not about tokenism. The artist should be the conscience of society,” he says. “Did you know that only three women have ever won the Tony for best play? Since 1947. That’s crazy. From here on out, we are shooting for 50- 50 at Shotgun.”
He’s hoping that risk pays off over time.
“It is smart of Patrick. He’s a savvy guy,” says Medak. “Women make up more than 50 percent of all our audiences. Any astute artistic director should bear that in mind when programming.”