Our journey with Lady Percy started several years ago, when, as an actor and an army ‘WAG’, Máirín was asked to perform a speech of hers from Shakespeare’s ‘Henry IV’. She found it intensely moving, and was fascinated by the complex way in which Shakespeare depicts her relationship with her husband, the famous rebel Harry Hotspur: whilst it is at times loving, we also see the remarkable tension that looms over a relationship when a soldier is about to leave for war and perhaps not return. It’s a dark, overhanging fear which on the whole, for the sake of sanity, one tries not to mention. Lady Percy seemed to embody a specific anxiety and grief which affects relatively few families in Britain nowadays, but would have been commonplace in the lives of women in the Medieval period.
We loved the fire and articulacy in Shakespeare’s Kate, as well as finding her deeply sympathetic, but— alack!— she appears so infrequently onstage that we felt a huge part of her story was missing. We wanted to find out more about the historical Lady Percy— the first thing being that her name was not really “Kate” at all, but Elizabeth!
As a woman, in a world where communication was minimal, Elizabeth would have spent great periods of fretful anxiety inside a castle, not knowing who was King, who living or dead. She would also have been tasked with the responsibilities of running the Percy estates and castles in the absence of her warrior men. She would have risked her own life, bearing children. She would have had her own friends, fears, stories, concerns and doings that we know so little of. As women and as historians we wanted to consider what a woman’s life back then would really have been like. How would her family’s attempt to overthrow a king— when her brother and husband ultimately join forces— have seemed to Elizabeth? And, surviving on the Scottish border, running a lonely castle in place of her rebellious husband, what else would have been on her mind?
As writers, our great ambition is to create weighty, inspiring parts for women to play. Women have long been outnumbered 10:1 on stage, and as we left university and drama school, we found ourselves becoming increasingly bored of not seeing women in plays that we could relate to. We want to write roles that actresses can aspire to, young girls will want to grow into and that men will find every bit as interesting when they hear their stories told. After a year of research and impassioned hard work, we are ready to take Lady Percy to the next level. We have scoured castles and archives, working with a number of universities to piece together details of Elizabeth’s life. We are penning the finishing touches on a new history play which is funny, moving and relatable, presenting unrecorded stories of the past for modern times.
ln order to move the play forward, we need to showcase our work. We have already received interest from leading national theatres and will be staging a rehearsed reading for industry and donors on the 5th October. All of our work so far has been conducted at our own cost, with no renumeration. Whilst we lovingly devote all we can to this project, we require additional funds for our October workshop and showing to happen, and for us to secure future industry support. Money received will cover the cost of hiring a venue, refreshments, paying actors and our director for their work, rehearsal spaces and other administrative costs. We have a detailed budget and plan of action, but we need help to make it happen.
And now, to borrow Hotspur’s battle cry: ‘Esperance, Esperance, Percy!’
