ABSTRACT
Because the professional acting companies in Renaissance England did not generally include female actors, it is common to exclude women from considerations of early modern theatricality. A recent collection of essays edited by Pamela Brown and Peter Parolin, however, demonstrates how rewarding it can be to counteract this critical oversight and investigate instances of early modern female performance. In her contribution to the collection, Bella Mirabella focuses on the parts women played in the medicine shows of the mountebanks or ciarlatani who peddled popular cures and folk remedies throughout England and Italy. While women were not usually the leading figures, Mirabella contends that they were, nonetheless, “crucial members of these troupes, acting as performers and healers and often responsible for the very success of these medicine shows.”1 In what follows, I will argue that Mirabella’s work recreates an important context for reading All’s Well. The challenging character of Helena-the wandering “Doctor She” whose highly theatrical cures ambiguously arouse both faith and skepticism, anxiety and desire-is perhaps best understood as an onstage enactment of this other onstage identity, the “Quacking Dalilah” or female mountebank.2 As the play’s principal performer and healer, Helena is largely responsible for whatever successes this notoriously problematic comedy achieves (see Figure 6.1).
