MEDEA/BRITNEY

What Will the Neighbors Say? Presents the Cloudbusters’ MEDEA/BRITNEY
Previously presented by What Will the Neighbors Say?, Sophia Frank and José Rivera Jr. for the FringeClub @ the Nuyorican, as part of the NYC Fringe BYOV | 2019
Developed at NYU Tisch and Thirsty Theatre Nights | 2015

By contrasting the character of Medea with the public tragedy of Britney Spears, MEDEA/BRITNEY uses multimedia elements to explore themes of proper femininity, the performative properties of public female bodies and the mythology of motherhood. The one-person show re-locates Medea’s story to Spears’ bathroom in 2008 when, at the height of her highly-publicised breakdown, she locked herself in the bathroom with her children. Subsequently, she was hospitalized and an on-going conservatorship was granted to her father. The show juxtaposes Medea’s decision to carry out the murder with Spears’ choice to return the children, considering the women’s respective punishments.

MEDEA/BRITNEY was devised as part of a class taught by Kate Whoriskey at NYU’s Experimental Theatre Wing. After further development at NYU, the project received a workshop production at the Living Gallery, curated as part of Thirsty Theatre Nights, in 2015. Last October, a re-imagined workshop was presented as part of FringeCLUB, an initiative of the NYC Fringe, at the Nuyorican Poets Café, where the production was praised by Theatre is Easy as “combining Classical and modern female archetypes…[so the] tortured heroine reminds us of the enduring struggles of outspoken women in a patriarchal world.” This is the project’s official premiere production.

Run time: 50 min

Image credit: Pablo Caldéron-Santiago