ABSTRACT
This chapter returns to The Maid’s Tragedy to consider the play’s post-1960 performance history in the light of some of the revised cultural preoccupations that have impacted on the British theatre in the past sixty years. Six productions are discussed, notably Philip Prowse’s for Glasgow Citizens in 1979, Barry Kyle’s for the RSC in 1980 and Lucy Bailey’s for Shakespeare’s Globe in 1997. The chapter’s thematic focus derives from Kyle’s explicitly homosexual interpretation of Melantius and Amintor’s relationship and his feminist take on Evadne’s role in the play. In addition, reviewers’ attempts to explain the phenomenon of audience laughter directed at the Globe staging are summarized and assessed.
