Flying V is very conscious that heroes and monsters come in all shapes and sizes. Many of our initial conversations about pieces would begin “Well, he could do X” and there would be a chorus of “Or she!” The set list we have was built upon making sure both our male and female cast members had moments to shine as the hero or the monster.
This week, we tackled the opening, which, while stylistically different from the opening in Love is a Battlefield, still gives the audience tastes of the performance they will see and lightly touches on various heroes and monsters that we were not able to explore in the full pieces. In this montage, a sea of people walk past and every so often one of them manifests as an iconic figure, doing a simple movement that the audience will recognize as a particular hero or monster. In this exercise, we came across a stumbling block: Iconic female heroes that everyone in the audience will recognize from a simple gesture.
In many cases, we simply re-gendered heroes. A female Robin Hood, for example. When it came to purely iconic female heroes, however, we were at a loss. Everyone, even if you are not a fan of comic books or legends, knows who Superman or King Arthur are from a very simple gesture: the opening of the shirt to reveal an S, or the pulling of a sword from a stone. The female heroes we could think of: Wonder Woman, Ellen Ripley, Eowyn, Peggy Carter, etc. were either fandom specific and not necessarily universally recognizable, or they did not have a simple iconic gesture that could instantly label them as that hero without costumes or props or more than two people.
The female heroes we did think of that had iconic moments in popular culture were characters like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz: passive heroines who have things happen to them, rather than, as our working definition of hero says, actively sacrifices of themselves for someone else.
This frustrated me. At first I was frustrated with myself for not being able to think of iconic female heroes. There are hundreds of amazing female heroes out there, like Captain Janeway from Star Trek, Alanna of Trebond from the Song of the Lioness series, the protagonist from the fairy tale “East of the Sun and West of the Moon,” and many many more. But they are not universal. If you had read the books or seen the shows, you would know the iconic moments. However, they have not permeated our culture to the point that everyone will recognize them through a simple gesture if the viewers are not hardcore fans.
I then became frustrated with our culture that female heroes do not have the same recognition, the same universally iconic status as the male heroes of our world. It is a huge issue, as exemplified by the current controversy over the lack of Black Widow merchandise alongside her male Avenger counterparts. We have been steeped in male heroes for so long, and our female heroes are only just beginning to get the recognition they deserve.
Now for some audience participation. I turn it over to you, dear readers. Who are your favorite female heroes? Tell us about them! Spread the fandoms! Make your heroines universal. And if you think of any universally iconic female heroes that we missed, let us know!
-Megan Reichelt
Flying V Fights: Heroes & Monsters
July 11-28
The Writer’s Center, Bethesda
