Read the directions document for further information and all the documents I have also uploaded to help you with your response
Part 1: 1 page response
For this assignment, watch the supplemental videos and concentrate on the primary readings that describe the theatre-going experience in this era. Then,
write about a 1 page reaction to what you are seeing/reading. How does this theatre reflect the times? Throughout the whole semester we have examined
the ways in which theatre is mostly a reflection of the current culture. How do you see it operating here?
Video:
Restoration Audiences: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIJXaBflc30
This video is a staging of The Country Wife, but it tries to contextualize what a Restoration play would have looked like back in the day. So I would
recommend the first few minutes when the focus is on the audience.
Part 2: 2-3 page response
- For your first part: identify at least three ways that this play is an example of Restoration comedy. Go back to the lecture and find the characteristics that I
assigned for it, and give me solid and specific examples. (Make this about 2/3 of a page.) - Second, what do you think Behn is doing with the presentation/treatment of women in this play. Some moments, women have agency and doing things for
themselves and at others they are being bartered like cattle. I think it is important that the playwright of this play is a woman. Do you see any subversive
agenda or theme she is highlighting. (Make this about a page.) - Last, go to Act II, Scene II: the first scene between Angellica and Willmore. The scene is inherently about a woman selling herself for sex. Willmore doesn't
want to pay and doesn't think that she should. But, in my mind, this scene is about theatre. If I were to say that Willmore is critiquing theatre (possibly Behn's
critique of Restoration theatre), find a passage in II.II of Willmore's that support the above statement. If this is, indeed, about theatre, what could Behn be
saying? (Make this a paragraph).