VCUarts presents ‘The Crucible’: a timeless tale with a womanly touch

Maeve Bauer, Spectrum Editor 

“I never said my wife were a witch … I only said she were reading books,” said Giles Corey, one of the main characters in Arthur Miller’s “the Crucible.”

In 1953, Arthur Miller shared his play, “the Crucible,” with the world, a tale of outlandish accusations that lead to blasphemous trials. About 70 years and some change later, the VCUarts Theatre department shared its rendition of the classic play under the direction of Emily J. Mattison. 

The production ran from Oct. 9-12 with a total of five shows, taking place at the W.E. Singleton Center on campus. Mattison’s rendition tackles the show from a female lens, observing how power can affect women in an all-encompassing patriarchal society, according to the VCUarts website. 

Mattison’s interpretation of “the Crucible” highlights the wrongdoings of character John Proctor, instead of treating him like a hero just because he is the main character, according to assistant directors Katherine Rice and Max Patterson. 

Rice felt it was reminiscent of the play “John Proctor is the Villain,” which came to a close on Broadway last month.

“It definitely highlights everyone’s faults, but especially the women are much more humanized in this production,” Rice said. “Especially Abigail Williams, who is usually put out to be the villain in a typical production of ‘the Crucible.’”

Text versus spoken word heavily influences how the public perceives what the play’s message is, Rice said. The intricacies of how the characters interact can differ significantly from page to stage. 

“I think that it’s really easy to read it and focus on the men of the play, especially John Proctor. He’s in almost every scene and he’s really just kind of the central driving force of the show,” Rice said. “With the way that we are doing this production, it’s way more focused on  all of the women and the people who would face oppression in today’s society. It’s just so easy to read it in a negative light because of the way that Miller wrote it.”

Rice and Patterson said they wanted to emphasize how the story is timeless and could exist in any era — Miller originally wrote the play as an allegory for McCarthyism during the second Red Scare. For VCU’s interpretation the directors were inspired by the #MeToo movement, specifically women who received public scrutiny and defamation for speaking out. 

In the program given out during show times, Mattison shared a director’s note about different witch hunts throughout history, from  the Salem Witch Trials, to the Jim Crow era, to Japanese internment camps to the AIDS epidemic. 

“This is something everyone in this country has either witnessed or experienced, and the root of each one is fear.” Mattison wrote. “Fear of the unknown, fear of change or fear of the loss of power or control.”

Patterson also mentioned how during the rehearsal process, they noticed students were faced with the reality of finger-pointing due to things happening in present-day politics.

In tandem with the production’s costume designer Eric Mayes, the directors emphasized the girls’ stories through their outfits. They did not go with the typical Puritan clothing expected from a traditional production of “the Crucible” in order to illustrate the dichotomy between characters.

“The people who want to live in this village and by the rules and religion that they follow, they are kind of in a more 50s feel in style, aesthetic and costume,” Patterson said. “All of the girls start out in like, Y2K, 2000s cutey little outfits. The costumes really reflect each character’s ideals and what era their sort of beliefs come from.”

Mayes and Mattison felt placing the characters in contemporary-appalachian inspired garb was a clear way to show the age difference between the men and the girls, and emphasize the highly inappropriate affair between John Proctor and Abigail Williams. Mayes also took inspiration from his own life as someone who grew up in a small rural community — the first outfit the audience sees Proctor in an outfit Mayes’ brother once wore. 

The girls’ outfits change throughout the play, starting in a youthful wardrobe and moving into conservative attire, such as shin-length skirts, full-sleeve button-up shirts and wool cardigans — in order to show the girls are not being true to themselves, and instead creating personas to hold onto the first sliver of power they get in this society. 

The whole production was very collaborative between the crew and actors, and Mayes worked closely with [Khadija Dominique] the actress playing Tituba, to ensure they got her costume

“Khadija specifically requested I had a little kind of arm for her on a necklace that she could hold onto and as part of her acting choices when she was remembering her home and spirituality and everything,” Mayes said. “I don’t think anybody is ever going to see that, but that’s for her and that’s for her performance.” 

Mattison’s adaptation of “the Crucible” was a fresh take on a classic American tale, transferring the sympathy and powers from the inciting men to the women affected, whether that be creating lies to save themselves or doing what they can to combat the lies told. 

“I want to open myself! . . . I want the light of God, I want the sweet love of Jesus! I danced for the Devil; I saw him, I wrote in his book; I go back to Jesus; I kiss His hand. I saw Sarah Good with the Devil! I saw Goody Osburn with the Devil! I saw Bridget Bishop with the Devil!” Abigail Williams, one of the main characters of Arthur Miller’s “the Crucible.”

CORRECTION: A previous version of this story misquoted a line from the play. The story has been updated with the correct name.