{"id":140493,"date":"2025-02-18T21:48:41","date_gmt":"2025-02-19T02:48:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/?p=140493"},"modified":"2025-02-18T21:48:41","modified_gmt":"2025-02-19T02:48:41","slug":"blue-stockings-at-muhlenberg-theatre-dance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/?p=140493","title":{"rendered":"‘Blue Stockings’ at Muhlenberg Theatre & Dance"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Fight for Education: Then and Now<\/strong><\/p>\n

Jessica Swale\u2019s feminist play ‘Blue Stockings’\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

brings the history of the women\u2019s rights\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

movement to Muhlenberg Theatre & Dance<\/em><\/p>\n

Allentown, Pa. (Feb. 18, 2025) \u2014 “Blue Stockings” may be set in 1896 at Cambridge University, but Jessica Swale\u2019s historical drama offers a narrative that is deeply connected to the present.<\/p>\n

\u201cA story like this is cyclical,\u201d says director\u00a0Dana Iannuzzi<\/strong>\u00a0\u201903. \u201cWe think this is so far removed from the time we\u2019re living in, but the fact of the matter is that educating women seems to be a scary concept.\u201d<\/p>\n

“Blue Stockings” comes to Muhlenberg College this spring, running Feb. 27 through March 2 in the Dorothy Hess Baker Theatre. The play tells the story of four undergraduate women studying at Girton College \u2014 the first women\u2019s college at Cambridge \u2014 and campaigning for the right to receive their degrees upon graduation. \u201cGenerally in Victorian England, it was thought that educational places were the man\u2019s sphere, and that the home was the women\u2019s,\u201d says dramaturg\u00a0Dan Gullick<\/strong>\u00a0\u201926. \u201cWomen were breaking these spheres whenever they were allowed into educational places at all.\u201d<\/p>\n

Women began attending Muhlenberg in 1957, and Iannuzzi \u2014 herself a 2003 alum \u2014 is grateful to the women who came before her. \u201cWe stand on other people\u2019s shoulders to get to where we want,\u201d she says. Muhlenberg alumni are invited to discuss the play with Iannuzzi at an informal Alumni Reception in the Baker Theatre lobby, following the 8 p.m. performance on Saturday, March 1.<\/p>\n

Abigail Boudreau<\/strong>\u00a0\u201926 plays Tess, one of the four boundary-breaking young women fighting for the right to an education. \u201cShe has this real burning need to prove herself to the world and prove that she\u2019s not limited by her gender, she\u2019s empowered by it,\u201d Boudreau says. \u201cShe is so much more than her gender dictates.\u201d<\/p>\n

The world of “Blue Stockings” also encompasses the teachers who encourage (or discourage) them, and the male students at the neighboring school, Cambridge\u2019s Trinity College.\u00a0Charlotte Alexander<\/strong>\u00a0\u201925 plays Miss Blake, one of the female teachers at Girton College who is a strong advocate for these women. \u201cMiss Blake sees the girls for what they can be, and pushes them to be brighter students,\u201d Alexander says.<\/p>\n

Samuel Beatty<\/strong>\u00a0\u201928 plays Ralph, a love interest of Tess\u2019s and a young man attending Trinity. Beatty explains that while some of the young men of that time might have wanted to support the fight for women\u2019s education, they were pressured into silence. Openly supporting opportunities for women could hurt a man\u2019s academic career. \u00a0\u201cRalph is not opposed to the actual movement of education for women,\u201d Beatty says. \u201cHe just has a lot of expectations from his father and the people around him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Assistant director\u00a0Dylan Sheppard<\/strong>\u00a0\u201925 explains that, despite being rooted in history more than a century ago, the characters will feel deeply familiar to audiences. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of human connection depicted in this play that remains today,\u201d Sheppard says. \u201cYoung people being awkward, that\u2019s a constant.\u201d<\/p>\n

During the rehearsal process, the company and creative team also got to meet some of the first women to graduate from Muhlenberg College. Muhlenberg became co-educational in 1957, a fact that is featured on a lobby display that dramaturg Dan Gullick is creating. The display can be seen during performances of “Blue Stockings” and will be a global timeline of women\u2019s education, dating back to the 1600s, when the first woman received her doctorate, to the present.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re at an educational place, so sometimes education is something we take for granted,\u201d Gullick says. \u201cIt is a privilege that we have, and seeing the fight for that privilege on stage makes you appreciate it a little bit more.\u201d<\/p>\n

The fight for education isn\u2019t just relegated to 1896 Cambridge: it\u2019s ongoing across the world even today. \u201cThis isn\u2019t just the story of the women of \u2018Blue Stockings,\u2019\u201d Iannuzzi says. \u201cThere are still young girls and young boys who don\u2019t get to go to school.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boudreau says that, despite this educational inequality, “Blue Stockings” leaves the audience with a message of hope. \u201cChange is something that can be really frustratingly slow in coming,\u201d she says. \u201cBut the most important thing is that you continue to fight for it.\u201d<\/p>\n

“Blue Stockings” runs Feb. 27 through Mar. 2 in the Baker Theatre, in the Trexler Pavilion for Theatre & Dance at Muhlenberg College. Showtimes are Thursday through Saturday at 8 p.m., Sunday at 2 p.m. Public tickets are $15. Youth tickets and tickets for LVAIC students, faculty and staff are $8. Tickets and information are available at\u00a0<\/strong>muhlenberg.edu\/seeashow<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0or 484-664-3333.<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Founded in 1848, Muhlenberg is a highly selective, private, four-year residential, liberal arts college located in Allentown, Pa., approximately 90 miles west of New York City. With an undergraduate enrollment of approximately 2,200 students, Muhlenberg College is dedicated to shaping creative, compassionate, collaborative leaders through rigorous academic programs in the arts, humanities, natural sciences and social sciences as well as selected pre-professional programs, including accounting, business, education and public health. A member of the Centennial Conference, Muhlenberg competes in 22 varsity sports. Muhlenberg is affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.<\/em><\/p>\n

Muhlenberg offers Bachelor of Arts degrees in theater and dance. The Princeton Review ranked Muhlenberg\u2019s theater program in the top twelve in the nation for eight years in a row, and Fiske Guide to Colleges lists both the theater and dance programs among the top small college programs in the United States. Muhlenberg is one of only eight colleges to be listed in Fiske for both theater and dance. The department was founded in 1983; the theater major was established in 1978, and the dance major was established in 1993.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Information provided to TVL by:
\nScott Snyder
\nMarketing Manager
\nMuhlenberg College Department of Theatre & Dance<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Fight for Education: Then and Now Jessica Swale\u2019s feminist play ‘Blue Stockings’\u00a0 brings the history of the women\u2019s rights\u00a0 movement to Muhlenberg Theatre & Dance Allentown, Pa. (Feb. 18, … Continue reading ‘Blue Stockings’ at Muhlenberg Theatre & Dance<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":140494,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5716,69,482],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-140493","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-allentown","category-in-the-valley","category-press-release-2"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/blue-stockings.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140493"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=140493"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140493\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/140494"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=140493"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=140493"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=140493"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}