The principal cast of “The Revolutionists”
“You don’t always get to pick the ending, but it doesn’t mean it’s not a good story.”
Paris, 1793. Four women enmeshed in the French Revolution and a Haitian uprising find sisterhood as they march to the – well. You know. Let’s not give away the ending, or leave the impression that “The Revolutionists” is dark.
“The Revolutionists,” opening Gamut Theatre Group’s Season 33, is a funny play about dark themes. The abuse of power. Oppression of women. How, and even whether, to use our talents to overturn a world order tottering toward authoritarianism.
Gamut’s presentation of Lauren Gunderson’s 2018 play about women finding their voices in a society intent on keeping them voiceless is timely and taut. An all-women production crew spotlights the continuing need for women to demand their inalienable rights.
Director Kelli Kauterman brought the relevant script to Gamut, the Harrisburg production company known for exploring contemporary themes through the lens of history and by amplifying overlooked voices. Kauterman keeps a fast pace, fearlessly embracing the entwined humor and pathos of four women in untenable situations.
Gunderson uses her literary license to convene three divergent historical characters, with one fictionalized from an amalgam of real women.
Here is writer Olympe De Gouges (Katherine Campbell Rossi), who went from young widow to campaigner against forced marriages and for women’s rights. In “The Revolutionists,” it’s her female friendships that inspire her to pen “The Declaration of the Rights of Women and of the Female Citizen” to counter the French Revolution manifesto declaring the rights of “man and of the citizen.”
Marianne Angelle (Weimy Montero Candelario), the play’s fictional character, represents the women fighting and spying during the simultaneous revolution of Haiti, fighting French enslavement on the island known then as Saint-Domingue. Her story bears witness to the freedom fighters left out of the history books. (Personally, I loved her red sash proclaiming “Revolution for All” and portending the sisterhood of suffragettes to come).
The name of Charlote Corday (Elizabeth Hood) comes down in history as the assassin of Jean Paul Marat, leader of the Revolution’s Jacobin faction that imposed its will through bloodshed and terror. “I have killed one man to save 100,000,” she said in her defense.
Whether Marie Antoinette (Rebecca Joy Thomas) was a heartless monarch or a misplaced Austrian girl drowning in a vat of French court intrigue, “The Revolutionists” finally gives her a say in her story. In a witty line, she justifies her infamous, and debunked, “let them eat cake” quote with, “I thought I was ordering lunch!”
Here, she is not a caricature but a human with children to love, fears to express, and a delight in ribbons – pretty red playthings that morph into reflections of the rivers of blood carrying these women to their destinies.
As the lights come up, we meet De Gouges, comically floundering as she seeks her writer’s voice. Soon, she finds herself sought by the other characters pleading to use her pen for their causes.
Angelle is visiting while conducting reconnaissance for the Haitian attempt to overturn France’s enslavement and colonization of Haiti, known then as Saint Domingue. She wants her friend to write pamphlets exhorting her cause.
The fiery Corday and flighty Marie Antoinette just walk in, because it’s perfectly natural that a future assassin needs some killer last words to shout from the scaffold and a doomed, maligned former queen wants someone to tell her story.
The happenstance of their encounters creates initial mistrust, but the four women build bonds over their convictions and strengths. They support each other on their way to the deeds they must do. Using the only tools available to them – a pen, a knife, a letter – they express their feelings to the men in their lives, with varying degrees of success.
De Gouges’ frustration at the National Assembly’s rejection of her “Declaration of the Rights of Women” to the National Assembly starts a slide toward discouragement. Corday meets her target in his bathtub, carving her name into history with, as the script puts it, a “stab-stab” – an assassination driving further rifts into a deep political divide.
The actors convincingly build relationships and find their characters’ commonalities. Rossi’s bouncy, energetic De Gouges gushes with ideas, ready to tell off the establishment about its shortcomings.
As Angelle, Candelario brings real-life passion to the character without a historic counterpart. Angelle knows that her fight could devastate her happy family, but Candelario helps us understand her fight against the hypocrisy of a nation seeking liberté and égalité while suppressing both to reap the rewards of Haiti’s sugar cane.
Hood is fierce as Corday, burning with determination to snuff out the voice of the extremist Jacobin leader whose words sent countless people to their deaths. Thomas’ flitting and fretting gives Marie Antoinette some of the night’s biggest laughs, but she effortlessly pivots to lines that nail the dire truths of the lives of these women – she can be “unexpectedly profound,” she says – and faces the credible and the trumped-up charges against her with regal poise.
Lynne Porter’s minimalist set tells us all we need to know about the fate of the characters – and maybe ourselves, if we fail to deploy our powers of art and storytelling against tyranny. In a nation where the zealots are in charge, a giant guillotine frames the doorway on the stage. Two more guillotines dangle over the heads of the audience.
The laughter diminishes as each woman faces her fate. Cracks in their solidarity begin to show as fear of the next knock on the door forces some to choose between activism or survival.
Gunderson’s play could use some editing here, as repetition of the key themes – words matter, stories matter, art can be as real as death, hope survives – blunt their emotional impact. Skillfully, the actors and Kauterman’s direction chart a steady course back to relevance and a revelatory connection with the audience.
The characters hope, in the words of De Gouges, to “outlive these f-ers.” In Gamut’s production of “The Revolutionists,” they do, confronting the rise of darkness in society through the illuminating power of theater.
“The Revolutionists”: Gamut Theatre Group, Oct. 4 to 19, 7:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, 2:30 p.m. Sundays. Tickets at www.gamuttheatre.org. Strong language. Recommended for ages 12+.
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