The fury of today's stage heroines

Peter Sellars's well-intentioned Desdemona, on-stage at Lincoln Center's White Light Festival this month, may have been unfulfilled, not to mention unfulfilling. But this unusual production does accomplish one significant purpose: It reminds us of how we want to see women portrayed on the stage today"“ not as victims, but as vanquishers.

This daring director has jolted audiences out of complacency for decades with his avant-garde interpretations of classical operas and plays, ranging from playful productions of Mozart's Cosi fan Tutti and Don Giovanni (which I loved) to his recent Othello (which I didn't), an ill-conceived 2009 production at New York's Public Theatre that starred Philip Seymour Hoffman as Iago.

Sellars's stints as an artistic director (of the American National Theatre in Washington from 1984-1986 and the Los Angeles Festival from 1990-1993) have been marked with controversy over his bold interpretations that often go against the intentions of the author or composer. He's fearless and often preemptive in his approach to text, especially when he feels passionately about the subject matter.

Such is the case with Othello, a play that has obsessed Sellars for a decade. Ten years ago, he and the Nobel prize-winning novelist Toni Morrison began an impassioned conversation about Shakespeare's play"“ which at the time Sellars disliked, but which intrigued Morrison as an opportunity to "respond" to Shakespeare about Othello's abusive, tragic treatment of his faithful wife. Together, they re-imagined the original play, calling it Desdemona.

Innocent victim

Using a story-telling, musical, concert form with an ensemble of singer/actresses, these estimable artistic collaborators bring Othello's murdered wife back from the dead to speak out against her fate as the innocent victim of a husband's irrational, brutal jealousy. To support her in this purpose, Sellars and Morrison also conjure Barbara, Desdemona's nurse (who is only mentioned obscurely in Shakespeare's Act IV, as the author of the "Willow Song," foreshadowing Desdemona's doom). Barbara is now re-imagined as "Barbary," an African, and her new song is composed and performed by Rokia Traore, a young Malian singer/composer, whom Sellars and Morrison invited to become their third collaborator.

Apparently, Morrison intended to give the virtuous Desdemona a voice, addressing the violence, racism, sexism and sadism of which Othello and Iago are guilty. And yet their Desdemona is very confusing. It lacks a clear story line, and if you don't know Shakespeare's play word-perfectly— including the reference to Barbara— you don't quite know what's going on.

Desdemona plays several parts, including her own and Othello's, which only compounds the confusion. Ultimately the play gets lost in its own poetry and music, and so do we.

Still, it's an admirable artistic effort, reminding us that women will always have a voice, one that must sing out against victimization.

Medea's revenge

Speaking of the newly-imagined Desdemona reminds us of other "classical" women populating our stages today, railing against injustice toward their gender. Unlike Desdemona, however, they are of the violent kind, and unfortunately tend toward self-destruction. Indeed, they can be imagined as Desdemona's avengers. Maybe that's why they've been brought back to stalk us.

Medea stalked the Brooklyn Academy of Music stage in 2002, in a fierce performance by the formidable Fiona Shaw (produced by the Abbey Theatre). Under the direction of her frequent collaborator, director Deborah Warner, Shaw gave us a rare, unconventional Medea to whom we could relate, as if she were a modern-day woman cruelly thrown over by an ambitious, upwardly mobile husband who found a "better deal" with a richer, more powerful second wife.

This Medea has been robbed of her demi-goddess status, her property, her citizenship and her children. Despite her horrific choices to restore her sense of identity and dignity, Shaw's Medea is an anti-heroine with whom we can surprisingly and easily empathize.

Hedda's desperation

Then there's the recent appearance— and reappearance— of Hedda Gabler (Ibsen's eponymous anti-heroine), no less than five times in major New York productions over the last ten years. Kate Burton played that fiery anti-heroine frozen stiff in the rigid 19th-Century Norwegian society on Broadway in 2001, followed by Elizabeth Marvel's dead-beat Hedda at the New York Theatre Workshop in 2004.

Next came Cate Blanchett's caged-tigress Hedda at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in 2005, followed by Katharina Schuttler's numbed Hedda in a German-language production from Berlin's Schaubuhne Theatre in 2006, and Mary Louise Parker's petulant Hedda on Broadway in 2009.

Why has Hedda been so frequently revived recently? Like Medea, Hedda— once the pistol-packing daughter of a general— has been rendered powerless to the point of desperation. Trapped in a thankless role as wife and hostess, trapped in her own body (pregnant by a husband she disdains), trapped by a blackmailing judge who senses her dread of scandal, she chooses to take her own life rather than grant society power over her.

"People don't do that sort of thing," goes the last line of the play. But today's revived heroines will clearly do anything"“ even the unspeakable, including infanticide and suicide"“ to preserve their dignity. Judging by the audience approval, apparently the painful image of a powerless woman is one that we simply can't tolerate today.

Lady Macbeth's complaint

Of special curiosity is the current popularity of Lady Macbeth. I'm not sure whether this blood-lusting lady has a legitimate gripe, other than that of a husband who shrinks from acting boldly or decisively. Yet she has made no less than three appearances on the New York stages this past spring. Why is Lady Macbeth enjoying such popularity? Maybe because, like, Medea and Hedda, she's a woman who who'd rather go mad than lose her power and dignity.

No wonder, then, that Peter Sellars and Toni Morrison resuscitated poor Desdemona, to try to restore hers. (They ought to have helped Ophelia too, while they were at it.)

No wonder, too, that the popular woman du jour is the formidable Lisbeth Salander, anti-heroine of Swedish author's Stieg Larsson's blockbuster The Girl Who…. trilogy. Lisbeth, a young woman who has been unspeakably abused sexually and legally, takes power into her own hands with a vengeance. Wresting control of her life from those who abuse her, she is Goth, violent, androgynous and ambidextrous (she handles cars, motorcycles, computers, guns, whips, chains, saws and any kind of electronic device). In short, she's reclaimed the same god-like power over society (and men) that Medea lost.

Where are we heading? This fall at the American Repertory Theatre in Boston, director Diane Paulus has invited the African-American playwright Suzan-Lori Parks to re-imagine the role of Bess, the prostitute with the heart of gold, in Gershwin's immortal Porgy and Bess. This much-anticipated, controversial production arrives on Broadway in December. Stay tuned. And remember, hell"“ and the theatre— hath no fury like a woman scorned.