Shakespeare’s Women

The book is designed to be used as a script for performances and text study. Like Shakespeare's Lovers, the plays is divided into two acts and uses a narrative voice- all Shakespeare's words and thoughts - to make a wonderful entertainment for all audiences.

Perfect for university and high school English and drama students, the play, in promptbook format, includes a glossary of terms, notes on obscure words and phrases, textual commentaries, musical scores and a list of suggested reading about the works of Shakespeare.

With some simple staging suggested, the scripts are ready to be staged and studied. 

Excerpt

The entire play takes place in the foyer of an adjacent ballroom. Party sounds and lively music can be heard offstage. Though orchestration and instruments are contemporary, the music has a distinctly Renaissance flavor. The stage is dimly lit with lush, candlight feeling.

The Male Narrator enters from stage left and crosses toward stage right. The Female Narrator enters from stage right and is heading toward stage left, to the offstage ladies’ room. They meet at stage center. He has obviously been looking for a woman to pick up all night, and he speaks with her.

Act I

Frailty, Thy Name Is Woman

The Female Narrator moves off left, laughing at the encounter. The Male Narrator is about to exit off right when Beatrice comes onstage center and stops down center in front of the fourth wall mirror to powder her nose.

The Male Narrator starts toward Beatrice with the intention of talking with her, but he is intercepted by Benedick, who pulls him off to the left and tells him his troubles. Benedick whispers, as he does not want to be overheard by Beatrice.

BENEDICK
O, she misused me past the endurance of a block! An oak but with one green leaf on it would have answered her. My very visor began to assume life and scold with her. She told me, not thinking I had been myself, that I was the Prince’s jester, that I was duller than a great thaw, huddling jest upon jest with such impossible conveyance upon me that I stood like a man at a mark, with a whole army shooting at me. She speaks poniards, and every word stabs. If her breath were as terrible as her terminations, there were no living near her- she would infect the North Star. I would not marry her, though she were endowed with all that Adam had left him before he transgressed. She would have made Hercules have turned spit, yea, and have cleft his club to make the fire, too. Come, talk not of her. You shall find her the infernal Ate in good apparel. I would to God some scholar would conjure her; for certainly while she is here, a man may live as quiet in hell as in a sanctuary, and people sin upon purpose, because they would go thither. So indeed all disquiet, horror, and perturbation follows her.

The Male Narrator is eyeing Beatrice lustfully, but he cannot leave while Benedick is busy railing against her. Beatrice finishes her primping and starts back to the party (stage right). Benedick storms off stage right, leaving the Male Narrator alone. Two beautiful women pass from stage right on their way to stage left exit, chattering excitedly about the party. The Male narrator is happy to see them and heads in their direction. The women laugh at him and walk off left. The Narrator, feeling rejected and humiliated, sits down on the lobby chairs. Othello enters, reeling backward in pain and followed closely by Iago. The Male Narrator eavesdrops on their heated conversation.