How can a play that was written in England in 1976, about a period in the 17th century, still be relevant to audiences in 2016 Canberra? It's a question that local art collective, COUP: Canberra are seeking to address, in their staging of Vinegar Tom, a play by Caryl Churchill that will open this month as part of Ainslie and Gorman Arts Centre's Ralph Indie season.
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Based on the witchcraft trials that persecuted women in England in the 17th century, Vinegar Tom is about oppressive social structures, gender inequality, and the impacts of fear and marginalisation on communities. It was these themes that first intrigued co-founders of COUP, Cathy Petocz, Hannah de Feyter and Becki Whitton. Together, the three artists – whose own experiences span experimental music, theatre writing, directing and acting – have assembled a cast of Canberran musicians and performers to bring the play to life.
The decision to make Vinegar Tom the first official project for COUP: Canberra was driven by a desire to point out – through a unique format - the gender inequality that still exists today.
"Hannah and I first read the play together around the time Canberra social media was examining pie charts with very slim slices indicating how few women play in bands," Petocz says.
"We wanted to stop talking about the lack of women in music and take action to change things –and not call it Ladies' Night– and Vinegar Tom seemed rather perfect."
Whilst not explicitly about the feminist movement, Churchill's play was written at the same time that the second wave of feminism was reaching its crescendo, and the play highlights the way women are persecuted through a historical lens, that alludes to the modern equivalents of that experience. In a way, feminists today are like the 'witches' of yore – always suspected to have an ulterior motive, and persecuted for acting outside of the bounds of traditional femininity.
"It's a play about a lot of different women: single women, married, widowed, mothers, a rich teenager, poor working women, pillars of the community, outcasts, and those living on the edge," Petocz says. "Each character deals with a unique aspect of gender inequality, from slut-shaming to hysteria, legislation over women's bodies to the jealousy narrative in which women are made enemies of each other. Churchill is certainly challenging us to dig deep and identify the different forces at work in society and within our own assumptions about people."
Vinegar Tom is also unique in the way it brings art forms together. The play includes live music; De Feyter and Whitton have produced the sound design as part of their collaborative experimental music act, cilt, and have curated a line-up of Canberran musicians to perform the songs live throughout the play. The musicians include Passive Smoke, E.B. Kerr, Keresiya, Glass, Aphir, Marlene Claudine Radice.
The cast and the musicians are diverse in terms of their experience, backgrounds as artists and their styles – a very deliberate curation on the parts of Petocz and de Feyter.
"We've tried to reach into some different scenes – there are all these different creative pockets within Canberra and it doesn't always feel like there's a lot of cross-pollination between them. Community engagement is definitely a long-term project for us and this feels like a first step."
Putting the 'collective' aspect of COUP into action is a big part of producing Vinegar Tom.
"Producing a play, especially of this scale with nine in the cast and 10 musicians, is the perfect way to test a collective ethos. It's a highly collaborative art form, everyone working together in an intensive time period in an incredibly vulnerable way, and only a deeply indwelt ethos can survive," Petocz says.
In a cultural and political climate that is rife with uncertainty, Vinegar Tom also forces the audience to look within, and to examine how their own attitudes and actions might be contributing to the broader unsettlement in society.
"There's a big sense in the play of looking for someone to blame when things go wrong, some Other who is responsible for any misfortune suffered by the community...I don't think I need to detail how that's relevant right now,' de Feyter says. "I want young women to feel revolutionary zeal, and to be inspired to make art and demand change. And I want everyone else to come away feeling afraid of those young women. Just kidding! But also not really."
Vinegar Tom runs from 28 November to 4 December at Gorman Arts Cente: Ralph Wilson Theatre. For more information, visit http://www.agac.com.au/event/vinegar-tom/.
