IT’S a confusing time to be a girl today.
We are celebrating 100 years since the first women in the UK could vote, but our strong and powerful role models seem to be behaving in less than strong and powerful ways.
We are taught we can do anything, dress how we like, but then we are viciously criticised for doing just that.
Those and many other quandaries are discussed by a group of women, most of them still in their teens and early 20s, in Make More Noise at Bristol Old Vic until Saturday 4th August.
The project, devised to mark the Suffrage centenary by Bristol Old Vic Young Company and Adult Company, is directed by Lisa Gregan and brilliantly choreographed by Maisie Newman. It is “for everyone fighting for equality in all its forms,” says Gregan.
Performed by young actors talking about their own experiences as well as paying tribute to those who went before them, the show is at its most successful and involving when the music does not overpower the words, although the rap is shocking from so many aspects.
Comedy is interwoven with horror as the stories of oppression, disappointment, empowerment and infuriation tumble over each other. Expectations are dashed, actions pre-judged and male domination continues … what has changed in 100 years, we are asked.
Make More Noise is a rallying call, and one that the opening night audience seemed eager to embrace and take out onto the streets.
We’ll see.
GP-W