Hi guys!

I hope you’re all doing well and that this dreary, rainy weather isn’t getting you down! If you’re in the Albany area this weekend and are looking for something fun to do, I HIGHLY recommend going to see “Votes for Women,” a performance put on by the Siena College Creative Arts Department detailing scenes from the Women’s Suffrage Movement.  I was able to attend this past Friday night and I was SO impressed by the skills of everyone in the performance, including some familiar faculty faces.  I wasn’t quite sure what I was getting myself into when I decided to attend the performance because the flyer indicated that we wouldn’t be sitting in the theater per usual, that we would be walking around the building.  Our tickets contained a sticker on the back, each with a name and we were told that we were to follow the suffragist leader of that group.  My ticket read “Votes for Women” and I had the chance to follow Harriot Stanton Blatch (played by the wonderful June Casey) though various scenes throughout the Women’s Suffrage Movement, including the trial of the one and only Susan B. Anthony.  We literally walked all over Foy, including backstage, to reach these scenes and this is something that I have never done before!

I think the aspect of the performance that I was most impressed with was the historical accuracy that each cast member put into their characters.  The words spoken throughout the show were original text and content from the time period and many of the cast members were required to memorize extensive monologues in language that is not quite as familiar to us these days. In particular, Sandra Boynton who plays Susan B. Anthony, delivered her lines in such a way that I truly felt as if I had been transported back to her time. I was able to clearly see the absurdity in the way women were treated back then and honestly felt incredibly inspired after hearing the words spoken just so well and so passionately.

Check out the flyer above for location and time details for this weekend’s performance and please try to attend if you can! If you did attend the performance here at Siena, what did you think? Let me know in the comments below!

Julia (Student Intern)