In response to a review of "Fefu and Her Friends"
Note from the Editor-in-Chief: This article was written in response to an earlier post published on the Blognonian by the cast of Fefu and Her Friends. Although the review does not represent the views of the Blognonian as an organization, the review will remain on the website, but will have this response article linked to it. The Blognonian is a space for the student body built by the students, and having student body input and discussion is necessary in our growth as people and as a society. This is not to imply that it is the burden and the emotional burden of those in communities most impacted by the harm, but rather, we wish to formally recognize that these response letters are extremely valuable in allowing voices to be heard.
The cast of Fefu and Her Friends would like to respond to the Blognonian’s review of our production. We are responding to the review to highlight how the language that was used to discuss the play was harmful, sexist, and invalidating to the performance due to an inability to think critically about the show’s implications. Disregarding the play because it was “hard to understand,” actually affirms the necessity of its performance not only on college campuses but across the globe. Our goal with this response is not to alienate the author, or anyone else who might share similar feelings, but rather to ask each audience member to reflect on their impressions of the piece.
The author writes that the play “wouldn’t lose much if the language were unintelligible.” He then goes to describe the plot in a series of reductive sentences which end with a parenthetical phrase “(I think)” to prove to the audience just how much he did not understand the play. He states that the monologuing “ends up signifying nothing.” This opinion implies that Fefu and Her Friends has no impact. We believe it does.
The play is a work of surrealism written by Maria Irene Fornes. To argue that its plot is unintelligible simply because it strays from linear narrative is a colonial act. This opinion imposes Western standards of theater – linearity, clear cause-and-effect plot, and the dispensing of “gratifying emotional moments” – upon a piece of theater that ventures outside of those constraining norms. This imposition exposes a greater problem with global theater: mainstream audiences are quick to reject stories that leave behind Western narrative tradition. They are hesitant to engage critically with surreal performances because they expect artistic media to provide them information through a traditionally prioritized Western lens.
In this review, the author wants the play’s meaning to be more clearly presented to him. This is ironic given that Fefu deals with the pressures put upon women to perform for men. Despite this overarching theme, Fornes uses quite simple and succinct language to explore an abstract world. Fornes represents women “chattering among each other about nothing” on stage, and in doing so investigates the insidious effects of our patriarchal world. The assumption that women’s “chatter” is meaningless is in fact one of the many tactics used by the patriarchy to dismiss femme expression. The characters of Fefu express their pain clearly. One simply has to listen.
Fornes begins the play with a monologue about how women fail to connect in a patriarchal world, forced to perform and obscure their true selves. Fefu says, “women are like live wires…either chattering to keep themselves from making contact, or else if they don’t chatter, they avert their eyes…as if a god once said, ‘and if they shall recognize each other, the world will be blown apart.’” Fornes brings us into a world in which this idea is embodied – one not so different from our own. Emma recites a sonnet, reflecting on the pain of queer love unrequited. Christina grows angry at people who don’t conform, stating they threaten her way of life. Cindy recounts a dream of a sexual assault, screams “Stop and listen to me!” and is shocked when the man stops, only to resume his violence. Julia details the oppression forced upon her by the judges, and exposes, step by step, what the patriarchy wants from women. Paula reflects on the nature of love, and then calls out the gathered elitist society women for their exclusion of disparate voices. Cecilia details the importance of being part of a community, and the pain of being forced out of one for being different. Sue recounts the violence she witnessed upon her femme-identifying peers at the hands of medical professionals.
Perhaps these monologues “signify nothing” to those who are not able to relate to these experiences.
It is incredibly harmful to deem language which represents indescribable experiences as one of “self-sufficient academia.” It is truly a privilege to be able to deem oppression by the patriarchy, sexual politics, and the queer experience as “academic.” The reason one might misunderstand Fefu is not because the “language is complicated,” “the story is confusing,” and “the narrative is thrown out of the window,” but instead might be because the viewer is so far removed from these experiences that it is hard for him to empathize. Or perhaps the audience is uncomfortably conscious that they are being made complicit. As the LA Times eloquently states, “Fefu and Her Friends holds a unique place in modern American drama in part for the way it confronts the shared yet unspoken terrors of female identity. It’s one of those plays that, in validating the morass of feelings left behind by oppression, expands the range of possibilities of being.”
The statement “It’s hard to attach the label of ‘feminist’ to a play in which most of the female characters are interchangeable and undifferentiable” is simply inaccurate. The play has been recognized as the landmark of feminst theater by many scholars. Furthermore, the women of this cast and directorial team believe in this work. The cast and the dramaturg would be more than happy to sit down and have a productive conversation on this topic. Furthermore, each of these characters, as we described above, has intensely different perspectives, voices, physicalities, experiences, and relationships. Viewing these women as interchangeable is reductive and identity-erasing. Each of these characters represents a type of woman that we have met, or that we have been. We each see ourselves in every one of these incredibly different women.
Though the author blames the set and costumes for being distracting or overwhelming, we argue that the author chose to look rather than to listen. It is true that Fornes does not easily invite the audience into the world of the play. However, the society we live in rarely provides women a space to express their inner selves. The author yet again proves the necessity of Fornes’s work, showing how easy it is for people to tune out women’s words and experiences.
The recommendation to see “Fefu in another language – you can take in the dazzling set, the poised actors, and the nifty projections, all without worrying about the abstruse dialogue. Come to think of it, this production of Fefu may already be in another language – that of self-sufficient academia” is a further example of the violence and oppression that women have experienced throughout history. This paragraph proposes that an audience look at the women on stage instead of hearing them.
THIS AUTHOR RECOMMENDS THAT FEFU BE SEEN AND NOT HEARD.
Read that sentence one more time. These eight women have had their voices ripped away from them in their stifling twentieth-century society. This review proves that in our modern era, we may not have come as far as we thought.
Lastly, Fornes was an avant-garde, Cuban, and queer playwright, writing predominantly during the time when the industry was (and still is) dominated by white men. To label her work as intentionally abstruse is a gross mischaracterization of her life and her legacy, and the boundaries she broke for playwrights everywhere.
As a cast, we will be the first to admit that Fefu can be full of contradictions at first glance. That is, in fact, an identifying characteristic of the world Fornes presents to us. However, the audience members we spoke to, of many genders, left the production deep in thought. One audience member responded, “I didn’t get immediately pick up on everything intellectually, but I felt this production in my body.” Others expressed how meaningful the performance was to them, saying it resonated deeply with their experiences navigating a patriarchal world. This work has so much to say, and we are proud that so many members of the Brown community and beyond heard us say it.
Criticize the writing, the acting, or the style, but do not dismiss this work with such reductive language. This play may not be for you, but it is for many. Whether you enjoyed our performance or not, Fefu and her Friends is a powerful piece, and we would like audiences to recognize its validity and importance. We do not want this review to be the legacy of a production that has meant so much to us and so many others. Those who would prefer our silence should not have the final word.
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