The Range of Cross-Gender Performance on the 18th Century Stage
Back when I was collecting material for a trope podcast about the theater, I added a number of articles to my shopping list that I didn't get to at the time. This (and the next) are leftovers from that list. There isn't substantially new material here for me, but the author offers more background for gender-crossing in a theatrical context in general.
Major category: LHMPTags: LHMP LHMP #524 Friedman-Rommell 1995 Breaking the Code About LHMP Full citation:Friedman-Rommell, Beth. 1995. “Breaking the Code: Towards a Reception Theory of Theatrical Cross-Dressing in Eighteenth-Century London” in Theatre Journal 47, no.4: 459-79.
The focus of this article is how 18th century English audiences perceived and experienced cross-dressing on stage. A large part of the article involves a detailed dissection of the 1713 play The Humours of the Army; or, The Female Officer, by Charles Shadwell. A major theme is the interplay not only between female performers taking on male roles (and its implications off stage), but characters who—within the scope of the performance—perform cross-gender roles. Another aspect of the analysis is a comparison of male versus female stage cross-dressing. There is a focus on the potential variability in reception, depending on context and individual background.
The article spends a while presenting and discussing the shift in understanding of sex/gender between the “one-sex” system (women are imperfect men) and the “two-sex” system (women and men are different species), while noting that both models were prevalent in the 18th century, offering different understandings of the “meaning” of gender-crossing.
There is a discussion of how lesbian possibilities have largely been overlooked in this field, while reviewing the evidence that such possibilities existed in the 18th century. But concerns about women cross-dressing were largely focused on her rejection of a normative domestic role, not the possibility of her embracing something entirely different.
A taxonomy of female cross-dressing contexts is offered, distinguishing between roles in which a woman cross-dresses specifically to pursue (or avenge) an existing heterosexual relationship, versus situations in which the actress cross-dresses for a purpose not related to the role, such as to use or show off specific performance skills, or to provide titillation to the audience.
In contrast to earlier theatrical conventions around cross-dressing, 18th century male cross-dressing on stage was primarily for comic effect, presenting a parody of femininity. In contrast, when female cross-dressing was done for comic effect it was to emphasize female inadequacy, not to parody men. But female cross-dressing was used for other purposes, and prominent actresses who took breeches parts were often lauded as performing the roles better than a man would. This offered more options for audience identification (especially for the female audience).
There is a digression into connections and distinctions between the stage and the cross-dressing done as part of public masquerades. (See Castle 1983)
The remainder of the article is the detailed analysis of The Humours of the Army which involves a woman cross-dressing to join the army in order to take revenge on the lover who (she believes) jilted her, which in the end follows a standard marriage plot with them getting back together.
Time period: 18th cPlace: EnglandMisc tags: cross-dressing View comments (0)
