|
|
FDU PRESS
 |
| Scholarly Review |
 | SHAKESPEARE RE-DRESSED: Cross-Gender Casting in Contemporary Performance
ISBN# 9780838641149
Reviewed by: Dan Venning, City University of New York
Journal of Theatre Survey, Vol. 51/1, May 2010 |
|  | |
Shakespeare Re-Dressed: Cross-Gender Casting in Contemporary Performance came out of a seminar at the Shakespeare Association of America in 2004 and examines a specific type of performance: the performance of gender within cross-dressed Shakespearean performance. Although many scholars have chosen to explore the Elizabethan boy player, this collection eschews early modern historical analysis in favor of an examination of contemporary performance through the lens of cultural analysis; many of the productions discussed were staged after Judith Butler's influential assertion that gender is performed, not ontological. Several key performances, especially Cheek by Jowl's all-male As You Like It (1991) and the Globe's all-male Twelfth Night (2002), are examined in multiple essays, yet this is accomplished without any sense of redundancy.
...this book is obviously of great interest to scholars working on cross-dressing in Shakespeare drama , or on any of Shakespeare's gender-bending plays, and most of the contributors write in vivacious, attention-grabbing prose. Shakespeare Re-Dressed (is a ) useful collection of essays, filled with fascinating contributions. (It) approach(es) the concepts of culture and performance in new and invigorating ways.
|
|
|
