When we last saw our heroines exit the stage in the American Shakespeare Center production of Two Gentlemen of Verona, disgusted by the duplicity of the “Gentlemen” of the title, we might have wondered where their lives would lead, without these silly guys to encumber them.
Fortunately, the answer comes in the form of a delightful, tuneful romp about two real-life women of the high seas. Maya Danks and Sara Linares, who appear so memorably in the roles of Sylvia and Julia in “2 Gents,” have the opportunity to tread the boards again, only this time as the real-life brigands Anne Bonny and Mary Read, in The Pirate Ballad of Bonny and Read, a real treat for audiences of all ages.
The story is set in a pirate museum, where a lone high school senior — the engaging Isabel Sanchez — wanders aimlessly at closing time, headphones on, clearly bored out of her skull. It doesn’t help that her officious, cellphone-addicted dad (Britt Michael Gordon, in one of his many comic roles here) has ordered her to come up with a topic for that big college application essay she needs to write, like, now. The Kid (that’s Sanchez’s character’s name, it says so right here in the program) is about to storm out essay-less until she discovers a statue of Bonny and Read, who both, of course, this being a theater, magically come to life. Said Kid forgets all about her pushy dad and joins a merry gang of maritime thieves, who welcome her once they discover that, in spite of her youth, she has a talent much in need on any pirate ship.
Vanessa Morosco and Peter Simon Hilton, founders of the 50/50 Shakespeare Project (Morosco is also the executive director of the ASC, and thus a woman of many hats), have created a fun evening that introduces us to the distaff side of all those pirate tales we grew up with. Between the songs and swashbuckling, there is time to dispel more than a few myths about piracy, and about the fierce women who sailed the seas for glory and riches.
Director Allie Babich has found more than a few gigs and gags to keep the story afloat, and the cast catches more than a few waves here. The show, of course, features musicians — known here as Musikers, and a fine band they be. Led by ASC Musical Director Christopher Seiler, they open the show with a traditional shanty or two (yes, the question of what one does with a drunken sailor does come up), then accompany the cast while Bonny and Read combine storytelling and song as they talk about their lives and adventures.
These pirates being women, their (usually male, usually creepy) biographers have been spreading lies about them for years, projecting all manner of absurd fantasies on these two otherwise clear-eyed women of the sea. Britt Michael Gordon and Geoffrey Warren Barnes II take turns as crusty, moldy old pedants who, dusty tomes in hand, giggle at the sometimes-insulting stereotypes foisted on our heroines. Fortunately, this production gives Bonny and Read ample opportunity to set the record straight and put these silly men in their place.
Some of the myth-busting is truly hilarious, too, especially when it comes to a pirate’s purported, feathered, BFF. Need a parrot? Not a chance, unless, of course, you fancy a Norwegian Blue that has clearly seen better days (my advice: make sure the kids bone up on their Monty Python before coming out). The single-shot pistols sported by our heroines net a bird or three, the prop department’s objections notwithstanding, and the zaniness left me wondering whether, given a harpoon or two, they might have also caught something “absorbent and yellow and porous”… but I digress.
The pirates Bonny and Read have recently come into their own as the inspiration for a famous statue, “Inexorable,” which now stands at the entrance of the Lewes Football grounds in the UK. Morosco and Hilton have created a truly fun, family-oriented show that dovetails nicely with the current repertory and invites us to rethink what we think women of talent have been up to all these years.
Running Time: 75 minutes, with no intermission.
The Pirate Ballad of Bonny and Read plays through November 16, 2025, in repertory with The Two Gentlemen of Verona (to November 15) and Romeo and Juliet (to November 15), 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 The Pirate Ballad of Bonny and Read are online here.
The fall season program is online here.
SEE ALSO:
‘Two Gentlemen of Verona’ at American Shakespeare Center is doggone good (review by Andrew Walker White, October 2, 2025)
‘Romeo and Juliet’ as endearing tweens at American Shakespeare Center (review by Andrew Walker White, September 11, 2025)
