Springboard Series (Fall 2021) | | Boston University CFA School of Theatre Program Book

Springboard Series December 10-13, 2021

CFA 102 First Floor Student Lounge 855 Commonwealth Ave

Welcome to Springboard!

A part of New Works, Springboard Series provides opportunities for School of Theatre students to present public readings of their new plays and works in progress.

New Works is a four-step process dedicated to the development of new plays at Boston University School of Theatre – from cold reads all the way to fully staged productions that are supported by a director and performed for audiences. All projects presented as part of the New Works trajectory are student written, directed, designed, and performed.

For more details about New Works at Boston University School of Theatre, visit www.bu.edu/cfa/ theatre/season. Watch our website for the Spring Season Announcement, coming soon!

The Body Electric

December 10, 7pm

Rockets Red Glare

December 11, 5pm

The Corruption of Morgana Pendragon Against A Village

December 13, 12pm

December 13, 7pm

The Body Electric December 10, 7pm

Artistic Team Playwright Director Dramaturg

Grace Goble Charlotte Weinman Sara Gorelkin

Cast Monica Lewinsky, Medusa Catherine Allday Davis Linda Tripp Bill Clinton Andy Bleiler

Grace Goble Kendall Mood Grace Ferrera Sam Regueros Charlie Berger

“You only have to look at the Medusa straight on to see her.

And she’s not deadly. She’s beautiful, and she’s laughing.”

-Hélène Cixous

A Note from the Director For over two decades, Monica Lewinsky’s story has centered on the voices of her abusers.

Monica/Medusa places Monica at the center of her own story, exploring the vilification of feminine sexuality, victim-blaming, and public shaming. This is, above all else, a play that attempts to investigate a traumatic event without causing any further harm than that which has already been done.

Charlotte Weinman Director

Bitches and Witches: The American Mythology of Monica Lewinsky In early July 1995, 21-year-old Monica Lewinsky, arrived in Washington, D.C. with dreams of making her mark on the political world. Upon starting an unpaid internship at the White House, she unknowingly took the first step in the events that would later become one of the most famous scandals in U.S. political history: The Clinton-Lewinsky scandal. Before the more recent government shutdown in 2018-2019, the 1995-1996 federal government shutdown was the longest failure of basic governmental function in the history of our country. While an intern would normally have no business interacting with the President, the 1995-1996 shutdown caused interns to take on more duties, allowing Lewinsky to be in close quarters with Clinton.

While the second government shutdown under Clinton’s administration is more notable due to its historic duration of three whole weeks, the first shutdown, which lasted only five days, from November 14, 1995 to November 19, 1995, is a key event in the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal.

According to the Starr Report, Lewinsky testified that Wednesday, November 15, 1995 [the second day of the government shutdown] marked the beginning of her sexual relationship with the President.

In a time without social media, public figures under scrutiny had no control of the narrative being formed about them. In 1998, the news of the affair broke, likely due to the exposing by co-worker Linda Tripp. The massive media blitz that followed was unprecedented, leaving Lewinsky subject to unrelentless shaming, and extremely invasive investigations by both US officials and the general public. While her affair with Clinton may have been consensual, her moment in the spotlight was far from it. Monica’s first time writing about her affair with President Clinton was in a 2014 Vanity Fair article, in which she said she “became a social representation, a social canvas on which anybody could project their confusion about women, sex, infidelity, politics, and body issues.” The public quickly villainized Lewinsky, painting her as the person who took advantage—obsessed with the President—instead of Clinton taking advantage of her, despite him being 27 years her senior and the superior in their vast hierarchical power difference. In 2018, Monica wrote another Vanity Fair essay, in which she wrote “He was my boss. He was the most powerful man on the planet. [He had] enough life experience to know better. He was, at the time, at the pinnacle of his career while I was in my first job out of college.” Despite a relationship being that of two people, the public made sure that the fallout of this one would rest squarely on the shoulders of Monica, calling her a “ditsy, predatory white house intern,” a “thong-snapper,” and “a stalker and seductress.”

By the mid-1990s—the same time as the scandal—the third wave of feminism was at large in the U.S. But even though the movement was in full swing, Lewinsky recalls there being no support from the feminists of the time. “Given the issues at play—gender politics, sex in the workplace— you’d think they would have spoken up. They didn’t. The movement’s leaders failed in articulating a position that was not essentially anti-woman during the witch hunt of 1998,” said Lewinsky.

Looking back, it is seen that the 90s were a disappointing time when it came to women supporting women. The decade was imbued with hostility toward women who defied social expectations.

In her book 90s Bitch: Media, Culture, and the Failed Promise of Gender Equality, author Allison Yarrow writes, “The trailblazing women of the 90s were excoriated by a deeply sexist society.

That’s why we remember them as bitches, not victims of sexism.” continued on next page

Monica Lewinsky, currently 48-years-old, is now an anti-bullying advocate and social activist, while also working in the entertainment industry, reclaiming and reframing her story.

Today’s story of Monica Lewinsky is far from the initial case of unjustly shifting a narrative, smearing blame on the woman while placing the man on a pedestal. Fables and passages from throughout time view women as the lesser than species, all too quickly offing them while their male counterparts remain innocent. Perhaps one of the earliest of these famed stories is the myth of Medusa.

In Greek mythology, and the version that most are familiar with, Medusa, also called Gorgo, was one of three Gorgon sisters. But unlike her sisters Stheno and Euryale, Medusa was born mortal. They were all generally described as winged females with human faces and venomous snakes for hair, who possess the ability to turn men into stone if they dared gaze into their eyes. Perseus, “the greatest Greek hero” and slayer of monsters is said to have slain Medusa with the help of other gods. He received a mirror shield from Athena, sandals with gold wings from Hermes, a sword from Hephaestus, and Hades’s helm of invisibility. Using the reflection of Athena’s shield, Perseus beheaded Medusa while she was sleeping, and proceeded to use her head as a weapon, which maintained it’s petrification ability, until he gave it to the goddess Athena to place on her shield.

However, in the poem Metamorphoses, written in 8 AD by the Roman poet Ovid, Medusa’s origin story is a bit different. Born a beautiful young maiden known for her lovely hair, Medusa was raped by the sea god Neptune (Poseidon) in the Temple of Minerva (Athena). The goddess Minerva punished the violation of her temple by transforming Medusa into a snake-haired monster and cursing her with the power to turn to stone anyone who was foolish enough to stare into her eyes. In recent years and after centuries of silence, people have referred to Ovid’s version of the myth and examined it through a feminist lens, beginning conversations about rape culture, abuse of power, and victim blaming.

The Body Electric follows Monica Lewinsky’s journey from her arrival at the White House to the fallout of her affair, using the age-old legend of the misunderstood snake-haired gorgon to highlight what can happen when other people claim our narratives and turn us into the villain of our own story.

Sara Gorelkin Dramaturg

Rockets Red Glare December 11, 5pm

Artistic Team Screenplay by David Aaron Cohen Based on the book by Iris Chang Directed by Kolton Bradley

Cast Tsien Hsue-Shen Theodore Von Karman Jiang Ying and others Acting Ensemble

Allan Kuang Lachlan Boyle Mavis Joy Manaloto Kamden Collins Bishop Edwards Jacob Schmitt Henry Sirota

The Corruption of Morgana Pendragon December 13, 12pm

Artistic Team Playwright Director Dramaturg Stage Manager

McKayla Witt Noah Putterman Emma Roth Ash Strange

Cast Morgana/Morgan Le Fey/Mordred Merlin Arthur Guinevere Lancelot Voice Voice Voice

McKayla Witt Billy McColl Raymond Vasco Annika Helgeson Kenneth Yotsukura Kira Gandolfo Leah Hohauser Jayna Meyer

Against A Village December 13, 7pm

Artistic Team Playwright Director

Elliot Dupack Gabriela Medina-Toledo

Cast James Henry Fay Cassandra Chorus of Students

Zach Kelley Sam Regueros Grace Ferrara Valyn Turner Emma Weller Emma Cahoon Blanca Isabella