When I first joined Nightwood Theatre as Artistic Director, we commissioned Rose Napoli to write Mad Madge. The piece stemmed from Rose’s interest in the young woman – unabashedly thirsty for fame – who recorded herself throwing a chair off the 45th floor of a Toronto condo onto the Gardiner. Rose’s interest in this notorious Torontonian was swiftly usurped by Margaret Cavendish, 17th Century England’s original infamous fame hunter, who Rose stumbled upon through her voracious reading.
“She was a whore, they said, a madwoman. Her books were nothing but nonsense and obscenity. But to others she was a genius, a heroine. Her works were lively, elegant, free, full of the rage and liberty of a true poet. Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, was Britain’s first literary celebrity.” – Katie Whitaker
Margaret Cavendish is reported to have pushed boundaries through her prolific un-crafted writing and ideas, her unusual fashion sense, and through her most outrageous documented public act: standing up bare breasted with her nipples painted red at the theatre to thank the performers from her box as a display of wealth and patronage unheard of by women.
Despite her incredible shyness, hunting for fame was an obsession demonstrated throughout her life. She created a niche for herself that acted as an armour and amplifier by leaning into her own eccentric brand. Margaret believed that women were condemned “to live and die like worms” and to perish in “oblivion for want of fame,” and she did all she could to escape her gender’s fate. Cavendish was an active agent in making certain that we would be writing and thinking about her today, which she cemented not singularly through her writing or through her scandalous acts and comportment, but in the combination of both that functioned to assert her brand and legacy, even if in infamy. It is this search for power and place, and her inherent need to express her innovative and persistent ideas despite her lack of formal education, that makes her story so universal, extraordinary, and contemporary.
Margaret Cavendish is not the household name she hoped she’d be 400 years later, though she is well known and lauded by feminist historians. I am grateful that Rose serendipitously fell upon Madge and that she became obsessed with her enough to spend hundreds of hours crafting her beautiful and hilarious play that captures Margaret’s vivid mind and soul. The truth is, Rose had me at “her nipples were painted red,” but that was just Cavendish’s extraordinary marketing from the grave. It’s the collaboration between these fierce women (one living and one very dead) that is extraordinary.
I’m compelled to share Rose’s stage notes written in the forward of her script, “It works better when the casting, much like the play itself, is irreverent. Like Margaret, we’re looking for truth not accuracy. Let it be off, a little or a lot.” In Mad Madge, we will see a constellation of subversive casting for an ensemble playing in 17th century England – mismatched in gender, race, age, size, and sexuality. We see the time period smashing against itself. We see a design committed to a radical low waste mindset in a show centred around excess and extravagance. We see a deeply serious historical figure animated in a hilarious contemporary comedy. And most importantly, we meet an infamous forgotten heroine who charms us and reminds us to be true to ourselves despite the limiting world around us.
It takes the sincerest passion for theatre to not only write a play, but to star in it. There are thirteen performances of Mad Madge to catch before Rose Napoli deserves to sleep for a year.
Mad Madge previews on April 9 and will play until April 21 at The Theatre Centre. The show is produced by Nightwood Theatre in association with VideoCabaret. The show is written by Rose Napoli and directed by Andrea Donaldson.