Much like the women it centers on, Roundabout Theatre Company’s Liberation is rebellious and not just because it features nudity! Mainly I was struck by its violation of writing’s most cardinal rule: show don’t tell. If everyone could tell as well as Bess Wohl, maybe the rule wouldn’t exist in the first place! To put it simply, Liberation is stunning. Despite the darkness of its content (“why does it feel like it’s somehow all slipping away? And how do we get it back?” the narrator worries about the progress her mother so passionately fought for as part of the 1970s women’s liberation movement), it is a hopeful, heartfelt story told with deep vulnerability and sparkling charisma. In a moment when progress does indeed seem to be slipping away, this show is a gift, a reminder to keep fighting.
The main reason the show features so much telling is that it follows a consciousness raising group– a group where women gather in a rec center basement (perfectly evocative scenic design by David Zinn) to discuss the conditions of their lives. We hear about their oppression as they describe it to each other. There’s Susie (Adina Verson), who lives out of her car with her bird; Celeste (Kristolyn Lloyd), who’s in Ohio taking care of her mother; Margie (Betsy Aidem), a housewife who wants to stab her husband; Isidora (Irene Sofia Lucio), the only other married woman (but only for the green card); and Dora (Audrey Corsa) who goes from naively joining the group thinking it’s a knitting circle, to embarking on a journey of professional and personal empowerment. Each of these women is so sharply defined and instantly lovable I would gladly watch an entire play about any of them. Their precise characterizations are aided by expressive work by Qween Jean on costumes and Kikiya Mathis on hair. That they are for the most part describing events instead of embodying them does not take away from the theatricality of the show. On the contrary Whitney White’s direction points us towards inter-relational dynamics, reactions, and the brilliance of each character’s unique storytelling voice.
PC: Joan Marcus
At the center of the story is Lizzie (Susannah Flood), a sort of stand-in for both Wohl and her mother. She’s a journalist who covers obituaries and weddings, but more importantly, she’s a radical. Or is she? Or was she? Or who is she? This is what Lizzie (and Wohl) is trying to explore through this “Memory Play About Things [she doesn’t] Remember”. After all, if her mother really was such a radical, how did she end up in such a traditional marriage leading such a traditional life? We even meet her eventual husband (Charlie Thurston as Bill) but the show masterfully avoids becoming all about this relationship.
The show bounces back and forth between time, or rather it layers the 1970s and present moment on top of each other. The switch between time periods is sometimes jarring, even with gentle changes in Cha See’s lighting to orient us. I think that’s part of the point though. The present moment is shaped by the past, we can learn from the past by looking at the present moment, both the past and the present are always, well present.
PC: Joan Marcus
Following all these women, questions, and shifts in time makes for a sprawling piece, but it’s beautiful in how it lays out all the threads and lets them just be. Many questions are raised and most of them go unanswered. Who gets to tell what stories? What, if anything, is the tangible effect of consciousness raising? Who got left out of the women’s liberation movement and why (Kayla Davion plays Joanne, a woman who cannot join the meetings because she’s home with her kids)? Is it possible to have both freedom and love?
For the most part the lack of answers doesn’t feel like a cop out. After all, the show is as much about the meta narrative of what it looks like and how it feels to look back on a life and ask these sorts of questions as it is about anything else. “This is a play about my mother. For my mother,” Lizzie explains at the top of the show. Not only about, but for. It’s telling a story, but it’s also actively doing the work her mother began. The power in a piece like this is having witnessed it, it makes me want to continue that work too.
This post was written by the author in their personal capacity.The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not reflect the view of The Theatre Times, their staff or collaborators.
This post was written by Morgan Skolnik.
The views expressed here belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect our views and opinions.
