Ladies and Gentlethem – feeling a little upset? Have you tried hypnosis, psychoanalysis, smelling salts and it just doesn't work? Try The City for Incurable Women!
Paris, 1880s. In a psychiatric hospital, female patients performed ‘hysteria’ for the public. The doctors went to extraordinary lengths to prove their theories about the four stages of madness. Today, in the 21st century, the storyteller Kae, begins to explore this history. They trace the echoes to the present, feeling them linger in their own body, and perhaps get a little too caught in the story.
International theatre-collective, fish in a dress follows the thread of the history of hysteria as the audience becomes complicit in an outrageous tale of medical misogyny. (Warning: hysteria cure not included).
Devised by fish in a dress. Supported by Goethe Institut and London Performance Studios.
Performer: Charlotte McBurney
Director: Christina Deinsberger
Writer: Helena McBurney
Set and Costume Design: Vanessa Sampaio Borgmann
Sound Design: Bella Kear
Audio Described version in collaboration with Esther Irving
"Our children live in the most deprived ward in London and their parents cannot afford to pay for the classes and activities many more privileged children enjoy after school and at the weekends. A free-to-access youth group run by a local theatre in a professional setting is an incredible opportunity."
Local school teacher
