Feature Friday! Betsy Maguire Part Two: Misunderstood Women

Feature Friday highlights playwright Betsy Maguire, Part Two, as she sheds some light on misunderstood women in history through her plays. If you missed Part One, click here! https://findingabilities.com/2021/07/23/feature-friday-playwright-betsy-maguire/

One of the wonderful things about being a writer is the opportunity to express your views on issues you find compelling and important. Over two decades of playwriting, I’ve explored themes of racial bias, domestic abuse, alcoholism, PTSD, and suicide. And lately, I find myself writing plays, looking through a historical and feminist lens, with “misunderstood women” at the core. I’ll talk about three of those plays, here.

Last year, I wrote a play called “Cafe Amité.” It takes place in Paris in 1875, and chronicles a fictional meeting between two women from history. The first is Hattie Blackford, the daughter of a self-righteous preacher, who became an international courtesan. She had a very public affair with the Grand Duke of Russia and became the first American to be arrested by the Russia Secret Police and held in prison, without accusation. The second woman is Margaret Eaton, who found herself in the middle of a scandal called The Petticoat Affair, during Andrew Jackson’s administration. Hattie and Margaret are loosely connected, through Hattie’s father, and I thought it would be interesting to put them together, in conversation. “Cafe Amité” is a story of morals and manners, secrets and revenge and, ultimately, acceptance and understanding.

I was recently commissioned to write a play for the Simsbury Historical Society about accomplished women, and the road to equality. The play is called “The Day History Came to Town: The Women of Simsbury” and will be presented in September. I researched eight incredible women from history, all of whom were born in the 1800’s, and whose legacies include the suffrage movement, childcare advances, immigration support, community enrichment, recreation reform, artistic expression, and women’s empowerment. There is a pivotal character whose behavior was widely criticized at the time– unfairly, in my mind — and I found her the most interesting and satisfying to bring to life.

My most recent play, “The Mystery of Clara Cloud,” was commissioned by the New England Air Museum. It will be presented in October, in the museum’s three large exhibit hangars. The story centers on a fictional character named Clara Cloud, an early air mail pilot from Connecticut, and her shocking and sudden disappearance in 1935. There is history and humor, and mystery and intrigue, as the story highlights some of the unique challenges of being a female aviator in the Golden Age of Flight. Clara Cloud is one of my favorite characters I’ve ever developed: a plucky, brave, and resourceful young woman. I heard this play read aloud for the first time on Monday evening, and I was so touched to look around the table and see that I wasn’t the only one with tears in my eyes. It absolutely inspired me to keep writing, and to keep strong female characters at the center of my stories!

Finding the Ability to view history from a different perspective!

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