As part of the 2019 Mardi Gras Festival, Seymour Centre is proud to present the Sydney premiere of Jen Silverman’s dark comedy The Moors with award-winning director Kate Gaul at the helm.
After being lured by mysterious letters, seemingly naïve Emilie takes the position as governess in a household on the forbidding moors. Upon arriving, she discovers the stern and domineering Agatha along with her needy and flighty sister Hudley, a dog, and a glowering maid who isn’t always who or what she seems. The arrival of the governess sets this odd assembly on a strange and increasingly bizarre path.
“Jen Silverman’s bizarre and vivid script is a unique exploration of identity, gender roles, sexuality and what it is to write your own story. This play is different from any other play you have seen! Women are presented as seductive and violent; they kiss, they sing power ballads, they commit bloody acts. This is a play about female power. Inspired by the lives and works of the 19th-century novel-writing sisters Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brönte, The Moors mixes quasi-biographical information and literary references – it is neither adaptation or parody. It has a period feel and a Gothic sensibility but is very much a contemporary play.
The Moors is disrupting a set of conventions that have to do with visibility, the way women are seen and the space they occupy—in our current cultural moment. This play invites us into a conversation about right now. The Moors is set in 1840ish but it’s not a period piece … It’s a play about THIS exact moment in time.
This is a story about intimacy and the terrible struggle to be seen, to be known, to know yourself.”
– Personal comment from Director Kate Gaul
Inspired by the lives and works of the beloved but little understood Brönte sisters, The Moors is a cleverly-crafted, black comedy about love, desperation, the way women are seen and the space they occupy with relevancy to our current cultural climate.
From the company who thrilled Seymour audiences in 2017 with The Trouble with Harry comes a play of subversive edginess toppling the male-oppressed milieus of the Brontës and taking strong, passionate female characters to new heights. Plus, in a coup for this production, playwright Jen Silverman will come to Australia from the US for this Sydney premiere.
Tim Jones, Artistic Director of Seymour Centre, said, “The Moors is a subversive, gothic treat. It’s perfect for fans of the Bröntes plus wildly entertaining for those who enjoy unexpected twists to classic genres. We are eagerly anticipating the return of Siren Theatre Company to the Reginald stage for this must-see Mardi Gras production in 2019.”