A Good Night Out for the Girls

Innovative and engaging, A Good Night Out for the Girls looks beyond the confines of the political theatre paradigm that has been the mainstay of feminist theatre interests and theorising. In a departure from the many feminist theorists and philosophers in the last two to three decades who have sought to define and describe the sort of ideal, utopian feminism 'we need', this book looks to the field of theatre and performance to investigate the sort of flawed, sometimes confused and contradictory, but nonetheless lived feminisms that a significant number of women have actually got. Moving across the boundaries of mainstream and experimental circuits, from the affective pleasures of commercially successful shows such as Calendar Girls and Mamma Mia! to the feminist possibilities of new burlesque and stand-up, the book offers a lucid and accessible account of popular feminisms in contemporary theatre and performance.