Who will believe thee, Isabel?

Went on Tuesday, for the first time to Oberlin Summer Theater, and saw Measure for Measure. Sofie Rejto was marvellous as Isabella (a novice of the Poor Clares). She was the object of the temporary ruler's indecent proposal:
 
Measure for Measure Act II, Scene iv 

    Isabella: Ha! little honour to be much believed,
    And most pernicious purpose! Seeming, seeming!  
    I will proclaim thee, Angelo; look for't:
    Sign me a present pardon for my brother,
    Or with an outstretch'd throat I'll tell the world aloud
    What man thou art. 

    Angelo: Who will believe thee, Isabel?  
    My unsoil'd name, the austereness of my life,
    My vouch against you, and my place i' the state,
    Will so your accusation overweigh,
    That you shall stifle in your own report
    And smell of calumny. I have begun,  
    And now I give my sensual race the rein:
    Fit thy consent to my sharp appetite;
    Lay by all nicety and prolixious blushes,
    That banish what they sue for; redeem thy brother
    By yielding up thy body to my will;

    Or else he must not only die the death,
    But thy unkindness shall his death draw out
   To lingering sufferance. Answer me to-morrow,
   Or, by the affection that now guides me most,
   I'll prove a tyrant to him. As for you,
   Say what you can, my false o'erweighs your true.
    ...
    Isabella: To whom should I complain? Did I tell this,
    Who would believe me? 


Shakespeare wrote this play over four hundred years ago, and it is topical here and now.  Many women have said they were assaulted by Donald Trump, and they are either attacked or ignored.


In the last scene Escalus says:

    Come, sir: did you set these women on to slander 
    Lord Angelo? they have confessed you did.   
    ...
    Why, thou unreverend and unhallow'd friar,
    Is't not enough thou hast suborn'd these women
    To accuse this worthy man, but, in foul mouth...

Legal and religious terms are used throughout the play. The title is about justice, but when Jesus talks of justice, he also speaks of mercy.

For with what judgment you judge, you shall be judged: and with what measure you mete, it shall be measured to you again. – Matthew vii. 2. (3rd part of the Sermon on the Mount)

In Act V, the long final scene, Duke Vincentio says:

    Like doth quit like, and MEASURE still FOR MEASURE.
    Then, Angelo, thy fault's thus manifested;
    Which, though thou wouldst deny, denies thee vantage.
    We do condemn thee to the very block
    Where Claudio stoop'd to death, and with like haste.
    Away with him!

Angelo is a wicked man, a hypocrite, and dishonest. His public persona is very proper. He is a prude in public, and a pervert in private. Since this is a comedy, he is forgiven, and married off. Claudio is released from prison, and married. Lucio is married off.

Isabella does not want a marriage, and she wants to be forever chaste. She not only wants to be a religious sister, but a cloistered nun. Shakespeare was part of a recusant family, and in his plays the monks and sisters tend towards integrity. At the very end of the play, Isabella is twice again given an indecent proposal by the ruler. This time not the acting Angelo, but the Duke Vincentio. Shakespeare gives her no word, so if she responds it is by body language. The actress gave the right response with her arms and face [really, how could you ask that?]. The Duke set all the trouble in motion, and he played a part in disguise to intervene, instead of showing his true person and ending the trouble.

 

Lucio, a rakish fop with two whores

 Juliet

This theater was formally opened in December. In the early part of the play, i snapped a few pictures to see how they would come out. The light worked very well close by, but a few feet further the stage light washed out the actors' faces.