Written by Amanda Rodriguez.
Spoiler Alert
I recently went to see a local production of the infamous musical comedy Monty Python’s Spamalot (a Broadway adaptation from the 1975 hilarious Arthurian quest film Monty Python and the Holy Grail) at Asheville Community Theatre. Though running a little long at two and a half hours, I loved it. As a fan, it was wonderful to get to see a theatre company bring to life all the gags, costume changes, ridiculous accents, jokes and songs that make Monty Python so special. As a feminist, I’d like to examine how the theatre production measures up to scrutiny through a feminist lens.
First off, despite my love of it, there’s no denying that the original source material, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, is a sausage-fest. Most of the women are played by men, and the most noteworthy scene featuring women is a bunch of cloistered nun-types at Castle Anthrax who all desperately want to have sex with Sir Galahad (they thankfully omitted this scene in the play). Though Spamalot doesn’t greatly improve on the number of significant roles for women, it does add a host of female background performers who appear frequently as well as the show-stealing Lady of the Lake (often dubbed the Diva of the Lake). Though she is primarily a love interest, the Lady of the Lake is also essential as she’s the equivalent of a dues ex machina who solves dilemmas the cast faces, puts them on the right path for their quest and generally inspires enthusiasm in the pursuit of the grail.
The Lady of the Lake has a lot of tongue-in-cheek meta-songs, and the best one, “Whatever Happened to My Part (The Diva’s Lament),” actually acknowledges how little stage time she’s gotten in comparison to her male compatriots. Though this number concedes that her representation is at best uneven, it doesn’t do much to truly integrate the lone female character into the plot itself.
[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJqAYUAJbTk”]
In the above clip, we have Sara Ramirez of Grey’s Anatomy fame performing the role of the Lady of the Lake in the original Broadway production. She even won the Tony for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in 2005. I love that a full-figured woman of color was cast in this role, and the world recognized how brightly she shined.
In the Asheville Community Theatre Spamalot production, I was so pleased to see the astoundingly talented Nana Hosmer fill Ramirez’s shoes as the Lady of the Lake. The full-figured diva has a dynamite voice that playfully emulated different musical genres but also shook the rafters with its vibrato. I feel fortunate that I (and all the other theatre-goers) got to see this woman’s powerhouse performance.
All in all, though I lamented the lack of female characters and found the number “You Need a Jew” mildly offensive, I was delighted that, though the play felt the need to end with a wedding, it was a gay wedding between Lancelot and the song-loving, fabulous Prince Herbert. I was worried they wouldn’t have the guts for it, but then I remembered, hey, this is Monty Python we’re talking about here. I was, however, the most moved by Nana Hosmer’s Broadway caliber performance. She, along with Sara Ramirez, reminded me how challenging it is for women of color and women with bodies that don’t match Hollywood’s (very thin) standards to find quality roles in films and on TV. I hope this means that theatre is a more welcoming arena that is appreciative of talent and beauty that comes in different shapes, sizes and colors.
Bitch Flicks writer and editor Amanda Rodriguez is an environmental activist living in Asheville, North Carolina. She holds a BA from Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio and an MFA in fiction writing from Queens University in Charlotte, NC. She writes all about food and drinking games on her blog Booze and Baking. Fun fact: while living in Kyoto, Japan, her house was attacked by monkeys.