Regarding who Lady M has been in production and pedagogical history...Audiences and scholars alike love her, are fascinated by her, because there are so few characters like her. She is perceived as ruthless, ambitious, and blood-thirsty, which is especially intriguing given that she comes from a time in history when the ideal woman is supposed to be meek, submissive, pious, and faithful. Women have relished playing her because she is so strong, so powerful, and so unusual; she kneels to no one, refuses to hear no, but ultimately loses her sanity. In some ways, she's the female equivalent to Hamlet in the Shakespearean canon, the role one strives to achieve but always wonders if one understands completely. It is only in the last few decades that scholars and artists alike have started to question whether the bloodthirsty portrayal is actually doing her a disservice, reducing her to the villain where a psychological approach to the character offers so much more complexity, especially for our contemporary audiences.
It is only in the last few decades that scholars and artists alike have started to question whether the bloodthirsty portrayal is actually doing her a disservice, reducing her to the villain where a psychological approach to the character offers so much more complexity, especially for our contemporary audiences.
That's what we've tried to do in revisiting her story - understand who she is and how she arrived at the choices she made in Shakespeare's play through a contemporary, feminist approach to a complicated woman's story.
