As much fun as it always is to see the American Shakespeare Center give the Bard his due, it is absolutely thrilling when they expand our horizons to celebrate the genius of playwrights whose wit and humor have richly earned their place on the Blackfriars stage.
So, what have we missed? Have a look at Expand the Canon, the nonprofit dedicated to promoting plays written by women and underrepresented genders, and you’ll get an eyeful. There you will encounter many women of tremendous merit, whose subtle commentary on the gender relations of their own time remains strikingly (if frustratingly) relevant today.
Oh, and as their deadpan motto — “We read dead lady plays” — confirms, they also have a wicked good sense of humor.
I can’t thank director Emily Lyon enough for introducing us to Hannah Cowley, whose 1783 play A Bold Stroke for a Husband presents a much wider variety of women onstage than traditional theater has led us to expect. Cowley creates a world where women, often ingeniously, navigate a male-dominated world, each with their own stratagem, each with their own goals, and Lyon keeps the action moving at a dizzyingly brisk pace.
The play, a fixture on the London stage from the 18th to 19th centuries, is set in Madrid — one of those exotic southern locales people love to use when they fully intend to comment on their own milieu. It is here we find philandering husband Don Carlos (the rakish, boozy Blake Henri), who has been conned out of his wife’s estate through the wiles of his ex-lover Laura (the determined Angelique Archer). His wife Victoria (the equally determined Summer England) has devised a gender-bending stratagem to get both her husband and her estate back. Disguising herself as Florio (Twelfth Night reference, anyone?), Victoria manages to ensnare Laura and, one deception leading to another, regains what is rightfully hers.
Cowley’s play gives us a glimpse of audience tastes in satire from her day — with nearly every member of the cast disguising either themselves or their intentions, and by such indirections finding happy directions out. It can be impossible to keep track of who’s pretending to be what, but that’s Cowley’s method, and it offers the ASC’s company ample opportunity to set us giggling.
A typical taste of Cowley’s humor comes when the frustrated father/widower Don Caesar (ASC stalwart Christopher Seiler), anxious to find a husband for his daughter Olivia, hits upon a stratagem of his own: he’ll pretend that he’s about to marry a younger girl himself, to prod Olivia into finally taking her suitors seriously. He recruits a neighbor’s girl, Marcella, into the scheme, only to discover that she’s on Olivia’s side, and Don Caesar ends up with serious egg on his face. Marcella is played here with bespectacled, geeky impertinence by Angelique Archer, and her transformation in a matter of seconds, one scene to the next, from the mousy girl next door to Don Carlos’ femme fatale Laura, is one of the true delights of the show.
As Don Carlos’ daughter, Olivia, Isabel Lee Roden gives us the free spirit and determination of women who were all too often forced into marriages as a purely financial arrangement — taking one for the team, or the firm, so to speak. When confronted by a suitor who proclaims his passion for classical music (the inept Christopher Joel Onken as Don Vincentio), they develop a sudden, inexplicable passion for the kazoo. That Olivia meets her future mate, Don Julio, shortly after is, of course, par for the course. Darin F. Earl II plays the suave, self-assured Don Julio here, and you know the minute he hits the stage that he’ll carry the day, and Olivia to boot.
This being Spain, and this being the 1700s, there is a lot to do with both lace veils and fans. Modesty, of course, demanded women wear veils in public, which — of course — sets up some Twelfth-Night style routines to do with getting the women to unveil. Combined with Caroline Cook’s beautiful costumes, you definitely get the feel of being in an exotic Mediterranean locale (by way of London, of course). Then you have the fans, which, contrary to popular belief, are almost never used to fan oneself. Conrad Gothard’s hand-crafted models are heavy-duty and double as exquisite scene-stealers when not providing a vivid means of flirtation, thanks to movement coordinator Doreen Bechtol’s efforts.
The musical selections, as always, are to the point, and given where the story begins, songs about guys in dire need of a take-down set the scene, with Isabel Lee Roden’s rendition of Shania Twain’s “That Don’t Impress Me Much” and Summer England teaming up with Topher Embrey for Dottie West’s classic “A Lesson in Leaving.” The songs transition, in harmony with the action, as the intermission selections include Candi Staton’s “Young Hearts Run Free,” delivered with passion by Angelique Archer and Topher Embrey, and Christopher Seiler wrapping up with the Beatles’ classic “She Loves You,” because, well, you know how it goes with girl-loves-boy, girl-loses-boy, girl-plays-boy-to-get-boy-back kinds of tales…
Cowley makes a point of including many “inside baseball” references to Shakespeare throughout, which serve as icing on the cake of the comic action. She certainly was a force to be reckoned with onstage, and you really must catch her triumphant reincarnation on the Blackfriars stage before it’s too late!
Running Time: Two hours and 15 minutes, including one intermission.
A Bold Stroke for a Husband plays through May 2, 2026, in repertory with Twelfth Night (through May 3) and The Hound of the Baskervilles (through May 17), presented by American Shakespeare Center at the Blackfriars Playhouse, 10 South Market Street, Staunton, VA. For tickets (starting at $39), call the box office at (540) 851-3400 or purchase them online. ASC also offers a Local Rush deal of 50% off tickets on Wednesdays and Thursdays. Learn more here.
Cast and artistic team credits for A Bold Stroke for a Husband are online here.
The spring season program is online here.
SEE ALSO:
The twists and turns shine in ‘Twelfth Night’ at American Shakespeare Center (review by Andrew Walker White, March 11, 2026)
Nutty ‘Hound of the Baskervilles’ is a howl at American Shakespeare Center (review by Andrew Walker White, March 12, 2026)
