25 – 27 March

Ladies and Gentlethem – Feeling a little upset? Have you tried hypnosis, psychoanalysis, smelling salts and it just doesn’t work?
Try The City for Incurable Women!

Paris, 1880s. In a psychiatric hospital, female patients performed ‘hysteria’ for the public. The doctors went to extraordinary lengths to prove their theories about the four stages of madness. Today, in the 21st century, the storyteller Kae, begins to explore this history. They trace the echoes to the present, feeling them linger in their own body, and perhaps get a little too caught in the story.

But hysteria is far from over; its social consequences continue to extend and echo through generations. Stereotypes of ‘madwomen’ today led the company to explore the history of hysteria.

Discovering the hilarious absurdity and disturbing darkness of this story, The City for Incurable Women offers a queer perspective on a feminist history, exploring the repercussions for all genders.

International theatre-collective, fish in a dress, follows the thread of the history of hysteria as the audience becomes complicit in an outrageous tale of medical misogyny.

Devised by fish in a dress. Supported by Goethe Institut and London Performance Studios.

Performer – Charlotte McBurney
Director – Christina Deinsberger
Writer – Helena McBurney
Set & Costume Design – Vanessa Sampaio Borgmann
Sound Design – Bella Kear
Image Credit – Ellis Buckley

The Wardrobe Theatre, The Old Market Assembly, 25 West Street, Old Market, Bristol, BS2 0DF