Claire F. Martin throughout the rehearsal of “Arabella.” (All pictures by Nicholas Tycho Reed)
Claire F. Martin places the work of ladies writers on stage.
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When the current and future are unsure, we glance to the previous — to those that blazed trails earlier than us. Belle Esprit, a burgeoning theater firm spearheaded by author and director Claire F. Martin, provides a voice to these trailblazers by creating theater based mostly on ladies writers from centuries previous.
Readers might acknowledge Belle Esprit as the corporate co-producing the Shakespeare Tavern’s present adaptation of Jane Austen’s Satisfaction and Prejudice, working by way of June 1. Their manufacturing of Austen’s Sense and Sensibility additionally ran on the Tavern final 12 months, and a studying of Woman Susan, tailored from the Austen novella of the identical identify, will take the stage Might 25.
Like the majority of Belle Esprit’s work, these diversifications are all penned and directed by Martin, who began the corporate in 2023. Fueled by her schooling in feminist concept in addition to 18th and 19th century theater historical past, Martin’s objective is to provide “traditionally positioned items of labor, whether or not fictional or based mostly on true occasions, that make the ladies, femme or nonbinary individuals going to see them at the moment really feel like there’s legacy, heritage and eons of affection and assist behind them.”
Naturally, most of those productions are diversifications, which Martin sees as a possibility to focus on the scores of ladies who wrote in occasions when their phrases weren’t thought of welcome. The identify Belle Esprit even references this mission — a French time period that actually interprets to “energetic spirit.” The phrase was used within the 18th and 19th centuries to check with girls who have been thought of the lifetime of the social gathering or the belles of the ball. The extra refined utilization, nevertheless, was to check with ladies who have been suspected to be secretly publishing.
Belle Esprit’s inaugural manufacturing was in April 2023, when Martin’s adaptation of Charlotte Lennox’s 1752 novel The Feminine Quixote, titled Arabella, acquired a four-performance run on the Tavern’s Porpentine Stage. Admitting herself to be a really unfastened adapter, Martin takes these works and re-centers the feminine perspective in ways in which the unique authors might not have felt was attainable or reasonable.
Concerning her adaptation of Satisfaction and Prejudice, the place the connection between Elizabeth Bennet and her sister, Lydia, is way extra prevalent, Martin defends the necessity to make the story matter not simply in a theatrical context however in a 2025 context.
“I’ve not met that many ladies who’ve met their Mr. Darcy as a result of most Mr. Darcys are strolling crimson flags,” Martin says. “However I’ve definitely met lots of younger ladies who’ve had gross, creepy older males hit on them after which been informed by the world that it was their fault.”
Shakespeare Tavern’s Porpentine Stage — the identical stage that hosted Belle Esprit’s first manufacturing — will host the studying of Woman Susan. Certainly one of Austen’s earliest works and unpublished till after her demise, Woman Susan follows the determine of a widow and social outcast, whom Martin describes as a “charming, extremely charismatic, narcissistic, lipstick feminist,” and her beleaguered daughter Frederica, who comes into her personal over the course of the story.
The studying will as soon as once more characteristic course by Martin, with Amanda Lindsay McDonald showing as Susan and Alejandra Ruiz as Frederica. McDonald and Ruiz are forged in Satisfaction and Prejudice as properly.
Woman Susan, specifically, speaks to Martin’s need to showcase quite a lot of feminine personalities. “I’m so cosmically over the concept of the ‘robust feminine character,’” she says. “All ladies are robust as a result of now we have souls, and we stay in a patriarchy. A robust lady will not be an exception. All of us are robust, all of us are cool, all of us are sensible, all of us are fascinating and it’s the variety of our coolness that has allowed us to endure for all of those years.”
Martin voices her admiration for different corporations spotlighting ladies’s tales — resembling Synchronicity Theatre and The Bizarre Sisters Theatre Venture — however she feels that Belle Esprit’s deal with feminist historical past distinguishes them throughout the Atlanta theater scene — trying not towards the longer term however towards the previous.
“I really feel deeply dedicated to utilizing the previous as a fertile exploration floor, as a playground of kinds, by which ladies can hopefully discover some empowerment.”
The place & When
A studying of Woman Susan takes the Porpentine Stage on the Shakespeare Tavern on Might 25. Tickets, $15.
499 Peachtree St. NE.
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Luke Evans is an Atlanta-based author, critic and dramaturg. He covers theater for ArtsATL and Broadway World Atlanta and has labored with theaters such because the Alliance, Actor’s Specific, Out Entrance Theatre and Woodstock Arts. He’s a graduate of Oglethorpe College, the place he earned his bachelor’s diploma, and the College of Houston, the place he earned his grasp’s.
