Female-Focused Season of Theater Opens with ‘Company’
The season, which opens this month with Stephen Sondheim's Company, offers numerous roles for women and productions that center around women.
The cast of "Company"
SJU Theatre Company is preparing for a season of strong women.
“Theater as a whole is not lacking for outstanding roles for women, but the availability of these roles is not in balance with the number of women seeking them,” says Renee Dobson, M.F.A., associate professor of theatre in the Department of Music, Theatre & Film and artistic director of Bluett Theatre. “There are so many strong women in our program that I wanted to select shows for this season that provided plenty of opportunities to promote them.”
The season opens this month with Company, a musical that features eight principle roles for women. The comedy, about Bobby, a 35-year-old man who can’t commit to a relationship and his married friends, features music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by George Furth. In 1971, the show was nominated for a then-record 14 Tony Awards, of which it won six, including Best Musical.
Dobson says that the choice of a Sondheim show provides a unique challenge for the performers, many of who are music theatre majors.
“Sondheim is the most prolific and best composer of the 20th century,” she says. “His music and lyrics can be extremely difficult, which helps to reinforce the coursework that the students are doing.”
“There are so many strong women in our program that I wanted to select shows for this season that provided plenty of opportunities to promote them.”
Renee Dobson, M.F.A.
Jenn Tague ’22, a music major from Ambler, Pennsylvania, plays Joanne, the oldest and, because of her many divorces, most derisive of Bobby’s married friends.
“The character has a maturity about her that I have not really experienced in my life yet, so I really look to the strong women who have played her before — Elaine Stritch and Patti LuPone, to name two — in order to create the most genuine performance I can,” Tague says. “Company is great because it mixes comedy with relatable stories, and I think the women we have in the show are really stepping up and doing an amazing job at both the acting and musical content.”
Sam Jenkins ’21, a musical theatre major from Baltimore, Maryland, plays April, a not-so-bright flight attendant who dates Bobby. She says that Sondheim's tradition of writing strong female roles is represented well in Company.
"Sondheim wrote some of the most powerful songs and ballads in the show for women, including Another Hundred People and The Ladies Who Lunch," she says. "This show portrays women in a positive, progressive light while still lightly poking fun at marriage and the roles of men and women in relationships."
Company runs Oct. 24 – 26 and Nov. 1 – 2 at 8 p.m., with a matinee on Nov. 3. at 2 p.m. Tickets are $20 for general admission and $10 for students with ID, Saint Joseph’s faculty and staff, senior citizens and children under 12. Bluett Theatre is located in Post Hall, on Overbrook Avenue between 54th Street and Wynnefield Avenue.
In December, the theatre company will partner with the Department of Music, Theatre and Film for a production of the 2015 Tony-winning best musical Fun Home, an adaptation of cartoonist Alison Bechdel’s graphic memoir of the same name. Bechdel, who grew up in central Pennsylvania, was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award for the memoir, which explores her discovery of her sexuality and her relationship with her gay father.
The season continues in February with the all-female cast of Steel Magnolias and concludes in April with The Mystery of Edwin Drood, a mystery musical based on the unfinished novel by Charles Dickens.
