A Vote For "Suffragette"

Too long we have waited--like ladies--for our turn to speak. Ladies who wait won't get a turn. Ladies--interrupt! --Emmeline Pankhurst, Suffragette

The British Parliament granted voting rights to women less than a week after the death of Emmeline Pankhurst, the standard-bearer of the most militant wing of England's women's suffrage movement. The ironic timing of Pankhurst's death underscores her relentless struggle for women's voting rights--a goal which continued to elude her.

Suffragette, at Agassiz Theater March 8-10, 15-17, and 22-24, is the story of Emmeline Pankhurst and her cause. It is also a creative, alternately witty and moving piece of musical theater. The first original musical sponsored by the Radcliffe Grant-in-Aid in over 15 years, Suffragette is the creation of two Law School students, George Birnbaum and Josh Rubins. Birnbaum and Rubins wrote the script, lyrics, and score throughout the fall, and are currently producing and directing the play.

With a name like Suffragette and its theme of the woman's struggle against society's smug complacency, the play is assured of attention from the Harvard-Radcliffe community. But Birnbaum and Rubins undertook the production for reasons other than its timeliness.

Birnbaum and Rubins conceived the play around the dramatic intensity of the women's rights movement, and this intensity is the core of Suffragette--its story, its music, and its overall tone. "Intensity! Intensity! I'd rather see intense mistakes than passionless perfection!" director Rubins was once heard to yell at practice.

Suffragette adheres to the history of England's women's suffrage movement, but presents it through the prism of Emmy Pankhurst's life. She appears to provide the force and momentum which rallied England's women to the cause between 1890 and 1914.

The first act supplies the background of the suffragette movement by portraying Emmy's personal struggle between her role as wife and mother and her sense of duty to act for women in the political arena. Emmy's husband, a radical lawyer, encourages her to carry the flag for women's suffrage throughout their life together. However, she is plagued by a strangely familiar fear of success, and cannot make the leap into public speaking and political organizing until the death of her husband.

Shortly after Richard Pankhurst's death, Emmy musters the confidence to take the leadership of the suffragette movement. In the climax of the first act and the point of departure for the play's real "story," she joins other women's leaders in the theme song "Suffragette" committing herself to persistent political protest regardless of the sacrifice involved. "My own mind never allowed me to see what I see now:" she tells them, "the picture of a woman--a complete, loving woman--who can stand not beside a man, but in his place."

From there, the spirit and momentum of the suffragette movement guide the action of the play as the women replace peaceful political protest with arson and destruction of property. They repeatedly encounter set-backs, but in the final scene--after the women recapitulate their repeated imprisonments, their acts of burning down prominent homes and even the death of one of their members--it is clear that the momentum will be translated into voting rights.

Suffragette deals carefully with several questions bearing on women's rights and potential for action. In addition to Emmeline's fear of public prominence during her marriage, her sense of personal sacrifice for public good pervades the story. The conflict is somewhat resolved in Emmy's realization that much of her strength for public struggle comes from her family. However, she retains a sense of loss. The story also gives attention to the radical/conservative split in the ranks of the movement, between those women who rested their case with voting rights for upper class women and those who asked for specific attention to the rights of working women.

In order to preserve the drama of Suffragette without sacrificing the documented history that provides its backdrop, Birnbaum and Rubins have made several structural innovations in musical theater. One of these cleverly incorporates musical theater's most traditional element--the stock character. Alf and Charlie, two seedy English music hall singers and the only non-historical characters in the play, appear immediately after the overture and return periodically to personify the smug complacent attitude of Parliament and most of 19th century England toward the women's demands. Through the motif of 19th century music hall songs, they provide a constant mocking commentary on the women's efforts. Their theme song is a snide routine entitled, "A Woman's Place is in the Home."

Cinematic techniques fill in historical detail while adding structural unity to the production. Certain scenes are structured around related events which span a ten-year period of the movement. For example, in the second act, women in Manchester and London at various points in time appear simultaneously, collecting and begging for donations to the movement. The scene culminates with all the women converging on London to launch the political phase of their movement.

The music of Suffragette, written by Rubins and arranged by Peter Larson, orchestrator for the production, combines Alf and Charlie's music hall ditties with traditional theater music. With a full-pit orchestra and a strong emphasis on brass and cymbals, many of the songs have a marching, ballad-like quality which communicates the spirit of commitment that is at the center of Suffragette.

The entire production staff of Suffragette are long-standing devotees of Grant-in-Aid--until recently, the only theater society at Harvard that supported musical theater. Birnbaum, Rubins and Larson have directed or acted in every Grant-in-Aid production for the last six years. Every Grant-in-Aid production contributes its proceeds to the Radcliffe scholarship fund.

Matina Horner, president of Radcliffe, has taken a special interest in Suffragette for its contemporary message and for its theatrical promise. New York, Boston and national theater critics will attend performances of Suffragette at her invitation. If the contagious drama of the play's climactic scenes and musical numbers blends successfully with its innovative structure, the production may embark on a movement of its own. National attention could be the next step for Suffragette. But for now, its creative effort and powerfully dramatic message should easily command a loyal following in this community. After all, it's for the cause.