InsideOutA P R I L 2 0 0 1P R O D U C E D B Y T H E E D U C A T I O N D E P A R T M E N T

Denver CenterTheatre Company

C loud 9 is a wickedly funny, take-no-pr isoners , car nalromp that challenges conventional notions of genderand sexuality. S et amid the patr iarchal domination of

s exual and colonial politics of the 19th centur y, the fir s t actbegins in a Hollywood vers ion of darkes t A fr ica circa 1879.

C live: T his is my family. T hough far fr om home W e s er ve the

Q ueen wher ever we may r oam

I am the father to the natives her e

A nd father to my family s o dear .*

C live is a representative of a Br itish imper ial empire pos tedin colonial A fr ica where he is the r uler over ever yone andever ything he sur veys . Betty, C live’s subser vient wife, isplayed by a man.

Betty: I live for C live. T he whole aim of my life

Is to be what he looks for in a wife.*

C live is the patr iarch of this land and his duty is to civilize[whiten] the natives . T hus , his native s er vant Joshua, playedby a white man, s er ves as a visual metaphor.

Joshua: M y s kin is black but oh my s oul is white. I hate my

tr ibe. M y mas ter is my light.

I only live for him. A s you can s ee,

W hat white men want is what I want to be.*

C live’s son, Edward, is played by a woman.

C live: M y s on is young. I’m doing all I can

T o teach him to gr ow up to be a man.*

Edward: What father wants I’ d dear ly like to be.

I find it r ather har d as you can s ee.*

And C live presents the res t of the family: V ictor ia, por trayedby a rag doll, M aud and E llen.

C live: No need for any s peeches by the r es t.

M y daughter , mother -in law, and governes s .*

Cloud9

* from C loud 9Desig

n b

y B

renda E

lliot

B orn in London onS eptember 3, 1938, C ar ylC hurchill grew up in

England and C anada. In 1960,she received a BA in Englishfrom O xford Univers ity whereshe wrote three plays :Downs tair s , Y ou’ ve N o N eed toBe F r ightened and Having aW onder ful T ime. A fter gradua-tion she began to wr ite radioplays for the BBC including T heA nts (1962), Not, N ot, N ot, N otEnough O xygen (1971) andS chr eber ’ s N er vous Illnes s(1972). T his form forcedC hurchill to develop a cer taineconomy of s tyle which wouldser ve her well in her later workfor the s tage; it also freed herfrom the lim itations of thes tage, allowing her the freedomto wr ite ver y shor t s cenes ormake great leaps in time andspace.

In 1974, C hurchill began hertrans ition to the s tage. S heser ved as res ident dramatis t atthe R oyal C our t T heatre from1974-75. Dur ing the 1970s and1980s , she collaborated withthe Joint S tock and M ons trousR egiment companies which usedan extended workshop per iod intheir development of new plays .Both companies had a deepimpact on C hurchill’s develop-ment as a playwr ight. S he laterwrote, ” T his was a new way ofworking—[I felt] s timulated bythe dis cover y of shared ideasand the enormous energy andfeeling of pos s ibilities .” Whileworking with Joint S tock andM ons trous R egiment, C hurchillwrote a number of succes s fulplays including: L ight S hining onBuckinghamshir e (1976),V inegar T om (1976), C loud 9(1979) and A M outhful of B ir ds

(1986). M any of her mos t well-know plays , such as C loud 9,T op G ir ls (1982) and S er iousM oney (1987), s cr utinizethemes of gender identity, femi-nism, capitalism, indus tr y andpolitics .

E ven after s tr iking out on herown, C hurchill continued tomake use of an improvis ationalworkshop in the development ofsome of her plays . M ad For es t:a P lay fr om R omania (1990)was wr itten after C hurchill, thedirector and a group of s tudentactors from London’s C entralS chool went to R omania to workwith acting s tudents there andfind out more about the eventssur rounding the fall of the dicta-tor, C eauses cu. What finallyemerged from this proces s wasa play that revealed the dreadfuldamage done to people’s livesby years of repres s ion and thepainful difficulties in adapting tolas ting change.

A s C hurchill’s career con-tinues to develop, herplays s eem to be growing

more and more spars e and les sand les s inhibited by realism. InT he S kr iker (1994), sheemployed an as sociative, dreamlogic that some cr itics foundnonsens ical. T he play, a vis ion-ar y exploration of modern urbanlife, follows the S kr iker, a kindof nor ther n goblin, in its s earchfor love and revenge as it pur -sues two young women toLondon, changing its shape atever y encounter.

C hurchill mar r ied DavidHar ter in 1961 and has threesons . Her awards include threeO bie A wards (1982, 1983 and1988) and a S ociety of W es tEnd T heater A ward (1988).

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The PlaywrightA nd so we are led throughthe looking glas s into theplay. A ct two opens in

1979 London, though the char-acters have aged only 25 years .Here, there is a revers al of gen-der power. V ictor ia is a m iddle-clas s profes s ional womans tr uggling for control; she ismar r ied to M ar tin who doeshousehold chores . Betty hasdivorced C live and Edward is agardener with a faithles s lovernamed Ger r y. Into this m ix, L inappears . S he is a lesbian with ayoung daughter who chantss catological s treet rhymes andplays with a toy gun. In thisplay about relationships(between women and men, menand men, and women andwomen), the characters s eektheir own kind of happines s .T he divis ive wor ld in which theylive forces them to examineindus tr y, motherhood, power,family, money, geography, gov-er nment and sex. E ach charac-ter, as we all do, explores newoptions in the hope of gaining as imple s ense of freedom.“CLIVE: I look after

Her Majesty’sdomains; I think youcan trust me to lookafter my wife.”

—Cloud 9

T here are as many types of Br itish humor asthere are Br itons and their humor rangesfrom the sophis ticated verbal comedies of

O s car W ilde to the vulgar humor of Benny Hill. O necan say that Br itish humor is not generally asphys ical or s laps tick as that of their E uropeanneighbors or as s ituational as Amer ican comedy.1 Br itish humor has been des cr ibed ashighly verbal, mocking, outrageous , bawdy, rowdy,droll, witty, deadpan, pithy, vulgar, wacky, subtle,dr y, ir reverent, off-the-wall, s elf-deprecating and cynical but neveras cloying, emotional or mushy.O f all the var iety in Br itish humor,the techniques are often thesame: eccentr icity, irony and innu-endo.

M any Br itish view eccentr icityas their “ bir th-r ight” and do notfind er ratic behavior dis tas teful.2A s humor in the enter tainmentindus tr y has become more hos tile,aggres s ive and sometimes evenpointles s , the Br its have been thebir th mothers of such groups asM onty Python’s F lying C ircus . Toillus trate the comedy group’seccentr ic humor, a 1969 s kit witha new kind of cr ime follows :“ Gangs of elder ly women wereattacking respectable citizens ,beating young men to the ground with their purs es ,r iding their motorbikes through yar n shops , mark-ing their tur f with spray-painted s logans such as‘ M ake Tea Not Love.’ ” 3 T he “ Hell G rannies ” s kit,as it came to be known, was a hilar ious example ofdeviant behavior and a revers al of s tereotypes ,something C ar yl C hurchill also employs in C loud 9.In the play, a motley crew of V ictor ian types couplein taboo combinations with twis ted love affair s anddichotomous characters .

Irony is another element of Br itish humor. Forexample, if it’s raining hard, an Englishmanmight s ay dr yly: “ lovely weather.” In the movie,

G oldfinger , James Bond always undermined hisdar ing actions by mocking them. “ It is eas ier forthe Br itish to s lip into an ironic detachment fromtheir feelings than it is to expres s them.…However, this inability of Br itons to franklyexpres s their emotions without the cor ros ion ofirony is in its elf a source of humour.” 4

“ But what makes us[Br itons ] laugh? W ell, I supposethe main theme of much [of our]comedy is s ex. It is often s aidthat the English don’ t have s ex,they have hot water bottles . T hisof course is not tr ue, but what istr ue is that open, frank dis cus -s ion of s ex is largely absentfrom Br itish life. What we haveins tead, and this is another ver -bal aspect of our humour, is innu-endo,” 5 the indirect usuallyderogator y ins inuation.

C ar yl C hurchill’s C loud 9 is adar ing comedy with its gender-bending and sexual politics . T heplay employs “ a special combina-tion of mocker y and gravity; thatit represents a ner vous ratherthan intellectual reaction; that it

as sumes unexpected disguis es ; that it is indige-nous and pos ses ses a s trong imaginative quality;and that it s ometimes degenerates into buffooner yand childishnes s .” 6 C hurchill mocks V ictor ian atti-tudes and their pers is tence in today’s society. Inaddition, disguis es proliferate in the cros s -gendercas ting and adults por tray children with all theirplayfulnes s and petulance. It is bawdy and droll,vulgar and ir reverent, and full of eccentr icities .

The British Sense of Humour

“VICTORIA: I feelapologetic for notbeing quite sosubordinate as I

was. I am more intel-ligent than him

(Martin). I am bril-liant. “

—Cloud 9.

3

&

4

In the fir s t act of C loud 9, C liveis the center of a m icrocosmicwor ld. He governs as father

and colonial power ; his des iresare law. He coerces s exual favorsfrom the neighbor, M rs . S aunderswhile condemning his wife’s flir ta-tion with their fr iend Har r y and,although repuls ed by Har r y’s rev-elation of his homosexuality,refuses to acknowledge E llen’s .When his affair with M rs .S aunders is revealed, he blamesher and orders her to leave as heembraces Betty with renewedaffection.

C live’s language of powerequates s exual repres s ion withcolonial oppres s ion. For example,he tells M rs . S aunders she is“ dark like this continent.M ys ter ious , treacherous .” Betty’sinfidelity is compared to threatsfrom the natives . To Har r y, C liveconfides : “ T here is somethingdark about women that threatenswhat is bes t in us .” Fur thermore,any dis loyalty to C live implies dis -loyalty to the Empire. “ T hus , s ex-ual non-conformity implies cover tres is tance to author ity.” 7 He tellsBetty that if she were unfaithful,he would have to expel her fromthe household. When Har r y tellsC live of his homosexuality, C liveas ser ts that homosexuality con-tr ibuted to the fall of the R omanEmpire and ins is ts Har r y get mar-r ied at once. When he obser veseffeminate behavior in his son,Edward, he rejects him. F inally,C live wants all the natives to bedocile like Joshua, who has inter -nalized his oppres s ion, but asmas ter, uses violence on the s ta-

ble boys when trouble er upts .C ar yl C hurchill presents her

view of s exual and social condi-tioning as ar tificial and farcical.A s a result, she cros s cas ts manyof the roles . Betty, a V ictor ianlady, is per formed by a man, heradoles cent son by a woman, and awhite actor por trays the blackser vant. T his cros s cas ting s er vesto undermine C live’s s tr ict morals tandards and imper ialis t/pater -nalis tic attitudes , and challengesthe audiences preconceptions .“ D ivorcing male and females tereotypes from phys iology wasintended to phys icalize the char-acters ’ ps ychologically ambivalentidentities .” 8

In Act II we s ee changes ins tr ucture of power and author i-ty, par ticular ly as they affect

s ex and relationships . T he s exualnorms of A ct I have changed. Asetting in a public park may s ym-bolize opennes s , especially interms of over throwing s exualtaboos . Language changes ;ins tead of the s tilted and properspeech of A ct I, characters nowspeak openly of their des ires andpleasures . T here is no center ofcontrol as provided by C live inA ct I. O nly L in, the lesbian moth-er, s eems able to make decis ionswithout cons tant ques tioning.

S till, there are hangovers of theV ictor ian s ens ibility in is sues ofgender and s exual politics .M ar tin, V ictor ia’s husband, is likeC live in that “ he s eeks to definewomen to fit his needs .” 9 He iswr iting a novel from a woman’spoint of view, but attempts to con-trol V ictor ia by complaining of her

s exual unrespons ivenes s and herindecis ion over a proposed jobchange. Edward, now a gardenerin the park, wor r ies that he’ ll los ehis job if his homosexualitybecomes known. C athy, L in’sdaughter r uns around with a toygun and eventually wants dres s -es , ear r ings and a perm. L in, as as ingle woman, is s till relegated toa low-level job as a clerk in aclothing s tore and Betty hasdivorced C live, but has problemsovercoming her feelings ofdependency and inadequacy. “ A llthe characters make changes intheir personal lives , but they allemphatically acknowledge the dif-ficulty of doing so.” 10

In Act II, C athy and Betty areplayed by men. “ C athy repre-s ents the future; she is the

product of liberated pos t-1968parents who have dedicated them-selves to the excavation anddevelopment of the es sentialtr uth of the individual.” 11 S he isanimated and ar ticulate; sheres is ts guidance in the interpreta-tion of her painting, and her dres sand gun sugges t she hasn’ t iden-tified with any gender yet. WhenBetty feminizes her with jewelr yand hat, then C athy expres ses herdes ire for womanly things . T heend of the play is left open,encouraging us all to examine oursociety and ourselves .

POWERSEX,gender

T he Br itish presence in A fr ica beganin the 1600s with their par ticipa-tion in the s lave trade. By 1650,

this enterpr is e was flour ishing with for ti-fied and gar r is oned trading s tations onthe shores of what are today Gambia,S enegal, Ghana and N iger ia. A fr icanswere obtained through bar ter with thetr ibal r ulers of W es t A fr ican s eaboards tates and then shipped for s ale in theW es t Indies .T he late 1860s witnes sed an economicrevolution that affected ever y par t ofA fr ica. T he dis cover y of diamonds inG r iqualand attracted inves tment andimmigrants at an unprecedented rate.D igging for diamonds and laying railwaytracks required a vas t workforce whichcould only be found among the nativepopulation. If indus tr ialization was toproceed, the blacks of S outhern A fr icahad to be pacified and brought underwhite control.

T he opening of the S uez C anal in 1869benefited G reat Br itain more than anyother nation. T his water way, connectingthe M editer ranean O cean with the R edS ea shor tened the s ea route to India,the Far E as t and Aus tralia. F reight couldbe transpor ted more quickly and inex-pens ively; the canal provided for morerapid movement of Br itish warships andtroops to trouble spots in the empire.

Between 1880 and 1902, Br itish acqui-s ition of A fr ica was impres s ive: Egypt,the S udan, Uganda, Kenya, Z anzibar,Nor ther n and S outhern Rhodes ia (nowZ imbabwe), much of N iger ia, the hinter -land of the Gold C oas t and more. By the19th centur y, Br itish imper ialism had

swept acros s the wor ld. F rom 1872 to 1896,wor ld trade patter ns were changing which hitall countr ies , including Br itain, with a reces -s ion. T ar iff bar r iers were s et up and Br itishexpor ts to F rance, Germany, Italy, R us s ia andthe United S tates tumbled. T he argument forexpans ion of the empire was based not upontrade, but upon a new philosophy. In his book,T he E xpans ion of England, S ir John S eeleywrote of the special genius of the Anglo-S axon race. To him the Br itish represented asuper-race; and the fact that they “ had dis -pers ed acros s the globe and mas tered theirenvironment added to the general feeling thatthey were ideally qualified to r ule.” 12

W ith all these ter r itor ies , G reat Br itainneeded colonial adminis trators to con-trol the native population and keep the

English cons tituents s atis fied. C live of C loud9 could have been modeled on F reder ick, LordLugard, an adminis trator in both E as t andW es t A fr ica in the 1880s . Lugard believedthat white men in A fr ica should always s tickto a s eparate way of life that was an “ as ser -tion of super ior ity which commands therespect and excites the emulation of the(black).” 13 Insolent familiar ity by natives wasnever to be tolerated and would be ins tantlyrebuffed by an English gentleman. S ur vival inA fr ica needed phys ical as well as moral s tami-

na, and Lugard, unlike C live, exhibited s elf-dis -cipline and a s tr ingent regime. “ T he Br itishpeople gave their wholehear ted suppor t tomen like Lugard, who had shouldered whatRudyard K ipling called ‘ the white man’s bur -den’ .” 14

BRITISH COLONIALISM IN AFRICA

5

“(England) must foundcolonies as fast and far asshe is able … and thereteaching her colonists thattheir chief virtue is fidelityto their country, and theirfirst aim is to advance thepower of England by land

and sea.” —John Ruskin, Inaugurallecture at Oxford, 1870.

“An Englishman thinks he ismoral when he is only uncomfortable.”

—George Bernard Shaw. Manand Superman. Act III.

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LIBERAT ED LONDON

L ondon in the 1880s was a patr iarchal society thatattempted to control human sexual behaviorthrough severe social and legal s anctions agains t

any deviations from the male-headed, heterosexual,monogamous , child-rear ing, indis soluble family. S exwas supposedly confined to mar r ied couples and wassolely for procreation rather than recreation. In propermiddle and upper clas s circles , for example, womenwere supposed to have no s exual contact before mar-r iage---” a hand around the wais t, a kis s , and a fer ventpres s ing of the hand was probably the accepted lim it inmos t cases .” 15 O n the other hand, men were allowedto have premar ital s ex with s er vants and pros tituteswith little or no social or legal s anctions .

C hallenges to the heterosexual family s tereotypehave always exis ted, but have gained momentum inthis centur y with the growth of the women’s move-ment, the s exual revolution and gay liberation. In A ct IIof the play, we find a different kind of family - the les -bian L in and her child, C athy, living with V ictor ia, a het-erosexual, and Edward, V ictor ia’s homosexual brother.O n the per ipher y are: M ar tin, V ictor ia’s husband;Ger r y, E dward’s former lover ; and Betty, the mother ofV ictor ia and Edward.

L iberation for homosexuals was the ver y antithes isof ear ly Br itish law. T he English Bugger y S tatute of1533 pres cr ibed death for acts of sodomy; by 1861 itwas replaced with the O ffenses Agains t the Person A ctwhich promised a s entence of 10 years to life for s im i-lar behavior. In 1885, the C r im inal Law AmendmentA ct made gros s indecency, which includes all homosex-ual activities , punishable for the fir s t time. Lesbianactivities were not acknowledged to exis t and there-fore, were ignored. By 1967, the s exual climate hadchanged. Based on the recommendations of theW olfenden R epor t that inves tigated homosexual offens -es and pros titution, the S exual O ffenses A ct waspas sed. It s tated: “ A homosexual act in pr ivate shallnot be an offense provided that the par ties consent

thereto and have attained the age of 21 years .” 16

In the 1960s , Nor th Amer icans looked upon Englandas the s exually permis s ive, swinging London. T heBeatles , who toured the United S tates in 1964, madesex look nonthreatening and fun and the P ill made itpos s ible. Young men spor ted long hair as youngwomen bared their thighs in m ini-s kir ts . T he Br itishmodel T wiggy exemplified the new female form: flat-ches ted, s kinny, gir lish look. Br itish clothing des ignersproduced s kimpy clothes that claimed to free thefemale figure, but actually accentuated its vulnerabili-ty.

W ith s exual freedom came more vis ibility for gaysand lesbians . Gays were s ympathetically por trayed intwo Br itish films , A T as te of Honey (1961) and V ictim(1961). M os t major cities had gay clubs , bars andbathhouses that provided commercialized proof ofgays ’ exis tence. In 1965, the average person could notname a s ingle well-known homosexual; by the end ofthe 1970s , it was impos s ible to ignore them. T hus in1977, the fir s t lesbian M ember of Par liament and in1980 the fir s t gay M ember of Par liament publiclydeclared their s exual or ientation.

In 1979, M argaret T hatcher became P r ime M inis terof G reat Br itain and an era of conser vatism began.T he Amer ican pop journalis t Tom W olfe had labeled

the S eventies “ T he M e Decade,” refer r ing to the nar -cis s ism and self-indulgence that s eemed to character -ize contemporar y society. But an economic downturnin the mid-seventies replaced that attitude with one ofpes s im ism. R es traint and cutbacks colored the ear lyE ighties with political retrenchment and more conser -vative moral s tandards retur ned.

from the 1880s to the 1980s

Books—Aston, E laine and R einelt, Janelle. C ambr idge C ompanion to M odernB r itis h W omen P laywr ights . C ambr idge, U.K .: C ambr idge Univers ityP res s , 2000.C ar lson, R ichard S . T he Benign Humor is ts . London: A rchon Books ,1975.C hurchill, C ar yl. C loud 9. London: P luto P res s , 1983.English, James F. C omic T r ans actions . Ithaca, NY : C or nell Univers ityP res s , 1994.F itzs immons , L inda. F ile on C hur chill. London: M ethuen Drama, 1989.Innes , C hr is topher. M odern B r itis h D r ama 1890-1990. C ambr idge,U.K .: C ambr idge Univers ity P res s , 1992.Judd, Denis . “ Empire.” New York: Bas ic Books , 1996. in James ,Lawrence. T he R is e and Fall of the B r itis h Empir e. N ew York: S t.M ar tin’s P res s , 1994.K r itzer, Amelia Howe. T he P lays of C ar yl C hur chill. N ew York: S t.M ar tin’s P res s , 1991.M cLaren, Angus . T wentieth C entur y S exuality: a H is tor y. O xford, U.K .:B lackwell Publishers , 1999.N icolson, Harold. T he Englis h S ens e of Humor and O ther E s s ays . N ewYork: Funk and W agnallls , 1946.Pool, Daniel. What Jane A us ten A te and C har les D ickens K new . N ewYork: Touchs tone, 1993.S teele, V aler ie. F ifty Y ear s of Fas hion. N ew Haven: Y ale Univers ityP res s , 1997.T homas , Jane. “ T he P lays of C ar yl C hurchill: E s s ays in R efusal.” inPage, Adr ian, ed. T he Death of the P laywr ight? New York: S t. M ar tin’sP res s , 1992.Inter net—Brand, Q uentin. “ Br itish Humor – C ultural S eminar.” http://www.br itishcouncil.org.tw/english/ar ts /ar ts2-1.htm. “ C hurchill, C ar yl.” http: //www.imagi-nation.com/moons tr uck/cls c45.html. http://unix.sbu.ac.uk/s tafflog/wolfenden.huml.

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S OURC ES

1. Brand, Q uentin.

2. C ar lson, p. 9.

3. English, p. 10.

4. Brand, Q uentin.

5. Brand, Q uentin.

6. N icolson, p. 22.

7. K r itzer, p. 118.

8. Innes , p. 462.

9. K r itzer, p. 124.

10. K r itzer, p. 125.

11. T homas , p. 177.

12. James , p. 205.

13. James , p. 289.

14. James , p. 292.

15. Pool, p. 187.

16. W olfenden. htm l

17. C hurchill, p. 97.

NO T ES

Denver Center Theatre CompanyDonovan M ar ley, A r tis tic D irector

A divis ion of T he Denver C enter for the Per forming A r ts

Inside Out is intended for students and teachers but may beenjoyed by audiences of all ages.

Daniel Renner, Director of EducationLinda Eller, Editor

Sally Gass, Contributing WriterMelinda J. Jaz, Designer

T he s tudent matinee programis

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