A group of seven actresses performed a spirited rendition of William Shakespeare’s “All’s Well that Ends Well” Wednesday night in the Hopkins Black Box Theater.
Though Shakespeare originally wrote the play for an all-male cast of players, the all-female cast of players gave a performance laced with innuendo and showed women’s power to manipulate and entice men into doing their will.
The play, originally based on a story in Giovanni Boccaccio’s “Decameron,” tells of Helena’s use of trickery to woo her husband by arranged marriage into fully accepting her as his wife.
Dave Cavenaugh, a communication studies instructor and director of the play, said the performance of the play by an all-female cast is long overdue.
“The one thing I wanted to do was to give a show where women could shine,” Cavenaugh said. “It gave me even more pride to be able to direct such an experienced and intelligent cast.”
The play featured English professor Katy Powell, theater instructor Kristin Hanson, and students Wendy Armington, Desiree Bacala, Sue Lincoln, Tami RocheLedet and Annamaria Ruffino. All seven actresses performed multiple roles in the play.
Bacala says the chance to perform Shakespeare with the other women was exciting and fun.
“In a way, it’s sort of like we are saying, ‘Take that, Shakespeare,'” Bacala said.
Armington and Ruffino agreed the “Sex Dance” in the play’s third act was the most fun part of the play to perform.
“I was really nervous about it at first, but we sort of ran with it,” Armington said. “It is sort of a long play, so we tried to make it interesting.”
Many students were in attendance at the performance, a number of them having heard of the play in their speech communication classes.
Allison McElveen, a kinesiology sophomore, said she came both for class and because she loves reading Shakespeare.
“This is the first play I’ve seen in the Black Box,” McElveen said. “I didn’t realize it would be an all woman cast, so that makes it even more interesting.”