WHAT’S ALL THE HOO-HA?
Last Saturday, Berkeley’s Shotgun Players opened a play by Jen Silverman which is so provocative that some publications won’t publish its full title: Collective Rage: A Play in 5 Betties; In Essence, A Queer and Occasionally Hazardous Exploration; Do You Remember When You Were In Middle School And You Read About Shackleton And How He Explored the Antarctic? Imagine the Antarctic As a Pussy and It’s Sort of Like That.
Yeah, it’s sorta like that.
It’s a play within a play as told in perspectives by five characters all named Betty. Betty 1 (Nicole Odell) is a rich Upper East Side-dwelling gorgeous but bored housewife in a loveless marriage. She declares herself outraged, largely because her husband is cheating. Sexually repressed Betty 2 (Atosa Babaoff) is lonely, sheltered, uptight, and married. Feeling disconnected from people, women in particular, she has to use a hand puppet to process her feelings — and she’s never seen her own vagina. Betty 3 (linda maria girón) is a confident, fast-talking queer “voice of her generation” who wants to put on a play connecting women. Betty 4 (Raisa Donato) is a tattooed, butch lesbian — she loves pussy, working on her truck, and has unrequited love for Betty 3. Fresh out of rehab, Betty 5 (Skyler Cooper) likes working on her truck alongside Betty 4; owns a boxing gym where she trains Betty 1; and a “gender-nonconforming masculine-presenting female-bodied individual” fluid with gender identity.
Atosa Babaoff (Betty 2)
Worlds come together when Betty 3 is transformed at the “Thea-Tah” seeing A Midsummer Night’s Dream — what she calls “Summer’s Night Dream.” She subsequently quits her job at Sephora to become an influencer and develop her personal brand by directing her own show based loosely on Pyramus and Thisbe, the play-within-a-play in Midsummer. She casts all the Betties, each of whom undergoes a personal transformation in the process.
linda maria girón (3) and Raisa Donato (4)
Their plights are all about trying to find their personal identities and working through anger. In the face of white, male political (and sadly successful) attempts to control women and their bodies, Collective Rage reiterates the importance of celebrating women, their bodies, relationships, their truth, and their stories, which can be thought-provoking, funny, or just a matter-of-fact stream of consciousness. The concept of everyone being “Betty” creates an “all for one and one for all” sense of unity.
Nicole Odell (1), linda maria girón (3), and Atosa Babaoff (2)
As the Betties continue to reveal themselves in this 95-minute one-act made up of nineteen sharply written, short scenes, you may find yourself in one of three camps: The collective parts cohesify as a whole; it’s an existential mess that creates more questions than answers; or you love eating this play out, but it ends up leaving a strange taste. Personally, I vacillated between the three.
Skyler Cooper (5) & Nicole Odell (1)
This is a hipster niche concept in which all the Betties are a little or a lot queer. The fascination with their pussies is incessant, causing many of the women in the audience to catcall and cheer throughout. Unlike The Vagina Monologues, which is comprised of collective stories about female empowerment, Collective Rage takes quite some time to get there. Thus, when it’s over, you may not feel unsatisfied (after all, there are some funny, empowering bits), but you may sense its shelf life expires by the time you get to your car. And this is not the fault of the cast; director Becca Wolff ensures that the actors drive their points home hard.
Atosa Babaoff, Nicole Odell, Skyler Cooper, linda maria girón, and Raisa Donato
Amid a political landscape in which women’s bodies seem to be constant fodder for legislative control, it is quite refreshing to witness five women speaking about their bodies, their relationships, and their sex lives in ways that are hysterical, candid and undogmatic. It’s a shame that a play can be 100% feminist and utterly political, with characters (or caricatures sometimes) who rage and love and explore their bodies and make bad choices (i.e. being human), we are left to ponder our collective naval instead of our collective consciousness.
linda maria girón and Atosa Babaoff
photos by Ben Krantz
Raisa Donato, linda maria girón, Skyler Cooper and Nicole Odell
Collective Rage: A Play in 5 Betties
Shotgun Players
Ashby Stage, 1901 Ashby Ave. in Berkeley
ends on August 18, 2024 EXTENDED to August 24, 2024
for tickets ($10-$40), call 510.841.6500 ext 303 or visit Shotgun Players