Freaks of HISTORY
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Two Performance Texts Freaks James MacDonald of HISTORY Disability studies have long been the ‘MacDonald brings together domain of medical and pedagogical so many interesting academics. However, in recent years, the elements. I really subject has outgrown its clinical origins. admire his exploration In Freaks of History, James MacDonald of marginalization and presents two dramatic explorations belonging—which he of disability within the wider themes approaches through Freaks of HISTORY of sexuality, gender, and the Other. elements such as ethnicity, Originally directed by Martin Harvey and culture, language, class, performed by undergraduate students disability, sexuality, religion at the University of Exeter, Wellclose and spirituality.’ Square and Unsex Me Here analyse cultural marginalization against the Thomas Fahy backdrop of infamous historical events. Professor of English, Long Island University Post MacDonald, who has cerebral palsy, recognizes that disability narratives are rarely written by and for disabled people. ‘ Wellclose Square delighted Therefore his plays, accompanied by me. It is a wonderfully critical essays and director’s notes, vigorous concoction: are a welcome addition to the emerging expressible only in theatrical discourse of Crip Theory, and essential terms. Unsex Me Here is a Texts Performance Two reading for disability students and staggering achievement. I’m academics alike. still reeling from reading it.’ Peter Thomson James MacDonald is a playwright whose Emeritus Professor of work is regularly staged in the United Drama, Exeter University Kingdom. He is an Associate Research Fellow at the University of Exeter’s drama department, and the author of Russia, Freaks and Foreigners and Carnival Texts, both published by Intellect Books. ISBN 978-1-78320-735-0 00 9 781783 207350 intellect | www.intellectbooks.com Freaks of History 07350_FM_pi-ix.indd 1 11/25/16 9:24 AM 07350_FM_pi-ix.indd 2 11/25/16 9:24 AM Freaks of History Two Performance Texts James MacDonald intellect Bristol, UK / Chicago, USA 07350_FM_pi-ix.indd 3 11/25/16 9:24 AM First published in the UK in 2017 by Intellect, The Mill, Parnall Road, Fishponds, Bristol, BS16 3JG, UK First published in the USA in 2017 by Intellect, The University of Chicago Press, 1427 E. 60th Street, Chicago, IL 60637, USA This ebook is licensed under a Creative Commons CC-BY-NC-ND License. To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission. Rights to produce, film, or record any of the scripted excerpts included in this book in whole or in part, in any medium, by any group, amateur or professional, are retained by the authors. For production rights, please consult the individual authors. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Copy-editor: MPS Technologies Cover designer: Emily Dann Production manager: Richard Kerr Typesetting: Contentra Technologies Print ISBN: 978-1-78320-735-0 ePDF ISBN: 978-1-78320-737-4 ePUB ISBN: 978-1-78320-736-7 Printed and bound by Bell & Bain, UK. This is a peer-reviewed publication. An electronic version of this book is freely available thanks to the support of libraries working with Knowledge Unlatched. KU is a collaborative initiative designed to make high quality books Open Access for the public good. The Open Access ISBN for this book is 978-1-78320-737-4. More information about the initiative and links to the Open Access version can be found at www.knowledgeunlatched.org. 07350_FM_pi-ix.indd 4 4/16/19 11:04 AM To Martin, Erin and the companies, with my love and gratitude 07350_FM_pi-ix.indd 5 11/25/16 9:24 AM 07350_FM_pi-ix.indd 6 11/25/16 9:24 AM Contents Acknowledgements ix Author’s Introduction 1 Part I: Critical Essays 9 My First Playwright 11 Julian Meyrick Director’s Notes 23 Martin Harvey Crisis, Cruelty and Curation: Staging ‘Freakish’ History in 31 James MacDonald’s Wellclose Square and Unsex Me Here Jessica O’Hara Part II: Playtexts 41 Wellclose Square – A Performance Text 43 Unsex Me Here – A Performance Text 95 07350_FM_pi-ix.indd 7 11/25/16 12:25 PM 07350_FM_pi-ix.indd 8 11/25/16 9:24 AM Acknowledgements Martin Harvey and I have worked together for more than 25 years and for more than ten years on this module – probably a record length of time between director and writer. And while not without its anxious moments, our relationship has been as near ideal as artistic collaborations can be. It is not within my province, perhaps, to speculate on my contribution to Martin’s creative life. In my view, based on our experience, a director’s contribution to a production deserves all the plaudits accorded it. Directors combine spectacular judgement with dramaturgical wisdom and the consummate ability to communicate with performers. Martin’s expertise in all three is virtually nonpareil. Jessica O’Hara contributed a wonderfully incisive essay to Carnival Texts, my previous collection for Intellect. Superseding our adversarial sporting alliances, we share an abiding passion for post-colonial cultural discourse, evident here in Jessica’s wonderful essay, Crisis, Cruelty, and Curation: Staging Freakish History. As Julian Meyrick notes in his essay, our collaboration dates from the mid-1980s, when he directed productions of three of my plays, including a revival of Too Many Monkeys, my first full production. Julian virtually filled the Northcott Theatre with a lunchtime audience that was far more receptive than were any of Edinburgh Fringe audiences in 1980, a tribute to his perspicacity and creativity in taking the play beyond its ‘kitchen sink’ confines into the farther reaches of grotesque Degenerate Art. It would be a gross disservice to both Martin and Julian to speculate how Julian might handle these two plays, for they are equally gifted dramaturgs. And Julian has gone on to distinguish himself as a respected theatre academic as well as an award-winning director. His contribution here, in any case, resumes our partnership in splendid fashion. Erin Walcon contributed these vivid production photos of Unsex Me Here as well as assisting greatly in the direction of an outsize cast. The performers themselves were assessed as being among the best in the department’s history, certainly in terms of their commitment to the texts and to me. My association with Intellect, over close to a decade now, has been of the most commendable order, not to be taken for granted in this era when publishing anything is at such a premium and when publishing playtexts is even more precarious. When one factors in the untimely passing of founder Masoud Yazdani, the staff’s ability and determination to carry on are truly inspirational, and I am accordingly indebted to Jessica Mitchell, Patrick Duggan and Richard Kerr for their patient and consummate guidance, especially since this is, in many ways, the pinnacle of my career. 07350_FM_pi-ix.indd 9 11/25/16 9:24 AM 07350_FM_pi-ix.indd 10 11/25/16 9:24 AM Author’s Introduction 07350_Introduction_p01-08.indd 1 11/25/16 9:43 AM 07350_Introduction_p01-08.indd 2 11/25/16 9:43 AM obin Siebers, taking his lead from two disability theorists (Snyder and Mitchell 2005), develops the notion that ‘disability is the master trope of human disqualification’ into what he calls ‘the aesthetics of human disqualification’, identifying systemic and Tvirtually absolute discrimination against people with disabilities (Siebers 2010: 37ff). Siebers is much to be commended, first for targeting this discrimination explicitly and then for writing as a disabled person. A key aspect of this discrimination is that too few disabled people have been empowered to speak for themselves about disability. For example, Trevor Phillips was named spokesperson for the disabled at the launching of the British Equalities Bill (2008), though he is not disabled. This is a phenomenon that was not permitted to exist for women and for ethnic minorities in the feminist and racial equality movements. Robert McRuer acknowledges that disabled groups take the lead in activism against disability discrimination (McRuer 2006: 39ff) and adopts a Structuralist approach in developing what he calls ‘Crip Theory’, an extension of ‘Queer Theory’, critiquing heterosexual dominance of the status quo. This should encourage disabled people themselves to take a more active role in disability affairs. Siebers expresses the Structuralist link between the different anti-Establishment groups thus: Beneath the troping of blackness as inbuilt inferiority, for example, lies the troping of disability as inferior. Beneath the troping of femininity as biological deficiency lies the troping of disability as deficiency. The mental and physical properties of bodies become the natural symbols of inferiority via a process of disqualification that seems biological, not cultural – which is why disability discrimination seems to be a medical rather than a social problem. If we consider how difficult it is at this moment to disqualify people as inferior on the basis of their racial, sexual, gender, or class characteristics, we may come to recognize the ground that we must cover in the future before we experience the same difficulty disqualifying people as inferior on the basis of disability. We might also recognize the work that disability performs at present in situations where race, sexuality, gender, and class are used to disqualify people as physically or mentally inferior. (2010: 25) I do not denounce such representation any more than I refuse to accept the idea that disability is the master trope of disqualification because it originates with two non-disabled 07350_Introduction_p01-08.indd 3 11/25/16 9:43 AM Freaks of History commentators.