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ToolsSmith, Kirstin (2023) On the Couch: Casting, cruel optimism, and memory work. Theater Journal, 75 (1). pp. 1-18. ISSN 0192-2882
Full text not available from this repository.Abstract
This article responds to the use of “casting couch” in the defense of Harvey Weinstein during his New York trial for rape and sexual assault in 2020. It traces the emergence of “casting couch” in the early-to-mid-twentieth century as a means of naming, but not acknowledging, sexual exploitation and violence in proximity to casting practices. The “casting couch” cliché invokes genre-scenes which depict sexual exploitation and violence, particularly towards actresses, as pornographic, melodramatic, and farcical, framing it as a source of pleasure for an audience. I compare the conventions of “casting couch” to first-hand accounts by women working in the performing arts in the UK in the early-to-mid-twentieth century. My sources are drawn from interviews and life writing, comprising Dodie Smith’s autobiography, a collection of recorded interviews with music hall performers conducted by Martha Vicinus, and several biographies of performers by Stephen Bourne. I analyse how gender, class, and racialization interact in these accounts and their framing. I analyse these sources in relation to genre, drawing particularly on Lauren Berlant’s concept of “genre as defense.” While Weinstein’s lawyers utilized the genre-scenes of “casting couch” to defend a sexual predator against the consequences of his actions, the various women discussed here deployed them in more complex ways. “Casting couch” was a means to give sexual exploitation discursive presence, even while limiting that presence. By gesturing towards a joke, and invoking melodramatic tropes, the “casting couch” cliché sometimes defended women against the violence and inequality contained in the stories they were telling.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | visual arts and performing arts,literature and literary theory ,/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/1200/1213 |
| Faculty \ School: | Faculty of Arts and Humanities > School of Literature, Drama and Creative Writing |
| UEA Research Groups: | Faculty of Arts and Humanities > Research Groups > Creative Writing Research Group Faculty of Arts and Humanities > Research Groups > Modern and Contemporary Writing Research Group |
| Related URLs: | |
| Depositing User: | LivePure Connector |
| Date Deposited: | 20 Mar 2023 13:30 |
| Last Modified: | 09 Mar 2024 06:30 |
| URI: | https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/91584 |
| DOI: | 10.1353/tj.2023.a899353 |
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