Vagina Rex
& The Gas Oven
Play Reading
London Performance Studios presents Vagina Rex & The Gas Oven (1969), the first play in the Women’s Liberation Movement by Jane Arden.
The play is a powerful, interdisciplinary text about female rage and pain in heterosexual marriage, first produced in 1969. It was devised in the Arts Lab in Drury Lane, a key site in the alternative theatre scene of the 1960’s linked to Yoko Ono and David Bowie amongst many others.
Originally published by Calder and Boyars in 1971, the play has long been out of print, and will be reprinted this year for the first time in Radical Rediscovery, published by Montez Press.
The reading is part of Radical Rediscovery 1: Feminist Plays of the 1960s to 80s, a season of workshops and events programmed to celebrate the fifty–year anniversary of the first Women’s Theatre Festival at the Almost Free Theatre (1973–74).
This event was organised by Unfinished Histories, as part of the Associate Artists Programme.
Director
Kirsty Housley (she/her) is a director, writer and dramaturg. Recipient of the Oxford Samuel Beckett Theatre Trust Award for Cue Deadly, a Live Film Project, and the Title Pending award for innovation at Northern Stage. She jointly received The Stage award for Innovation in 2017 for The Encounter and was nominated again in 2018 for The Believers are but Brothers. She was an RSC digital fellow in 2022.
Cast
Alexander Gallimore : Fury
Gemma Brockis : The Woman
Genevieve Sabherwal : Fury
Meeri Aro : Fury
Tom Lyall : The Man
Creative Team
Joe Dines: Sound Designer and Sound Technician
Meg Ella Brookes: Singer and Songwriter
Susan Croft: Dramaturgical Advisor
Virginie Taylor : Video and Lighting Designer and Video Technician
About
Established in 2023, Fifty Years For The Fight For Inclusion (FYFFI) is a three year programme that commemorates the consecutive anniversaries of three key moments in the intersectional struggle for inclusivity in British post-war theatre.
It was initiated by Unfinished Histories, an organisation founded in 2006 by Dr Susan Croft and Jessica Higgs dedicated to preserving and celebrating the history of Alternative Theatre in Britain from the 1960s to the 1980s, and highlighting the pioneering contributions of marginalised Black, Asian, disabled, and LGBTQ+ communities, women, and other politically engaged theatre groups.
28/06
29/06
Dates and Times
Vagina Rex & The Gas Oven
Fri 28 June - Sat 29 June 2024
Location
Studio 1
London Performance Studios
Photography
Emile Clarke / LocknLens
