3rd
Annual New York International Fringe Festival  **Fringe
Excellence Awards given out August 29th**"Hysteria: Silence In Stills" by Hayley Finn At the Red Room Reviewed by David Roberts for for Theatre Reviews Limited Hayley Finn's "Hysteria: Silence In Stills" examines successfully the seamy underbelly of a nineteenth century medical construct which removed countless numbers of women from their homes and from their workplaces and "imprisoned" them in hospitals throughout Europe. The name of this construct: hysteria. The symptoms: certain "identifiable" gestures; screams; the hysterical attack. The abhorrent phrase "women should be seen and not heard" might as well have been the credo of neurologist Jean Martin Charcot who documented the physical manifestations of hysteria in his patients through the use of photography, not voice. These patients were women who had been hospitalized at Paris' Salpetriere Hospital after being diagnosed with the disease of the day: hysteria. Sigmund Freud, first working at the Vienna General Hospital with the Austrian neurologist Josef Breuer, was treating hysteria through the recall of traumatic experiences under hypnosis. Later, Freud studied under Charcot. Charcot's insight into the nature of hysteria is credited by Sigmund Freud, his pupil, as having contributed to the early psychoanalytic formulations on the subject. Symptoms. Diagnosis. A Disease called hysteria. Those afflicted? Mostly women. Late nineteenth century women still struggling for true equality with men. Women who, society thought, "saw too much" and, perhaps, "saw that which did not exist." Women who weren't even supposed to be reading or thinking too much. Hayley Finn's script is a powerful expose of the collaborative role of late nineteenth century medicine (particularly neurology and the nascent psychoanalysis) in the oppression of women. Playing the roles of both medical practitioner and a variety of patients (in and out of hospital), Ms. Finn's characters become very real and quite believable, characters with histories and relationships, characters the audience learns to care about in significant ways. As a result of "Hysteria," the audience will begin to question whether Charcot's techniques of recording symptoms were legitimate. For example, were the hospital photographers recording gestures and movements of an identifiable disease or did their very presence evoke behavior in patients who were eager to please, eager to "get better," eager to be released from hospital? Listen carefully to Finn's characters' stories. Hear the "fairy tale" and the story of one woman's escape from the hospital. Or was that escape really suicide? Marvel at the patient who adorned her bed and clothing with ribbons for the hospital staff. Meet the Queen of Hysteria." Hear the neurologist affirm unequivocally that "hysteria is common in those who read." Eavesdrop on patients struggling to understand the provenance of their "illness." Were they hysterics because they were being punished by God? Did they "catch" this disease? Could others catch it from them? And prepare yourself for the neurologist's detailed description of "the belt" and one patient's experience wearing this "medical device." Hopefully, you will never be the same. Next time you feel like saying to someone, "You're hysterical," pause and think carefully about the consequences of your statement. Further, think about the reason you would say that in the first place. Have women totally escaped the use of medicine as a tool of oppression and repression? Has contemporary society afforded women equal rights in every area of life? Or is it just as easy now as it was in the nineteenth century to assume that "those who see, see too much or, perhaps, see that which does not exist?" Reviewed on Saturday, August 21, 1999 "HYSTERIA: SILENCE IN STILLS" Written and performed by Hayley Finn. Directed by Susannah Melone. Sound design by Robert Kaplowitz; set design by X-ina Nicosia; light operator, Joanna Liao; sound operators, Dov Weinstein and Jimmy Smith; postcard design by Jonathan Van Gieson. At the Red Room, 85 East 4th Street between 2nd and 3rd (Bowery) Avenues. In August at the New York International Fringe Festival on the following dates: Tuesday the 24th at 7:30 p.m.; Thursday the 26th at 4:00 p.m.; Friday the 27th at 5:45 p.m.; Sunday the 29th at 1:45 p.m. All tickets are $11.00. For information and reservations visit http://www.fringenyc.org |