"Suffrage Tales"

I had the absolute pleasure of attending an event this past Tuesday at the National Archives, in celebration of the centenary for the women's right to vote. Over the past, and future months, several institutions are putting on special events as well as exhibitions in celebration of this particular centenary. Not only the event at the National Archives, but also my own university has a special case exhibition of items relating to the Women's Suffrage movement.

The reason behind attending this particular event at the National Archives, was because my friend (male friend) invited me and a few others to see him perform a play written by a student in collaboration with the archives. I invited two of my close friends to come along, not knowing exactly what to expect from this event, only things we knew at the time was that it was held at the archives (almost an hour away by tube*), it was in regards to the centenary celebration, there was a play/reenactment and a short film, invite only guest list (wasn't advertised outright on the National Archives event page), and free food and drink (who could pass that part up?). Although we knew what would be happening, in regards to schedule (fundamental events), we didn't know the specific subject matter, the participants or the order in which everything would be absorbed.

The event started off at 18:00 with arrival and light refreshments, but since the archives are at Kew, we were about 6 minutes late to the start unfortunately. Also during this "meet and greet" there was a display of all the artwork used in the short film that would be viewed later in the evening.

During this time, my two close friends and I each got tea or coffee (I burnt my tongue gulping it down before the introduction), h'orderves (small and fancy - including a prosciutto and cream cheese layered bread square) and fruit.

Since we arrived slightly later than the beginning of the opening of the event, we loaded one plate to split between the three of us and shared the food before going into the small auditorium.

Then at 18:15 there was a short introduction to the evening, in which an older (50s?) white man (head of the education team at the Archives I believe) quickly introduced the basis of the event. However the young woman who wrote the play (Kimberley Turford) that would be performed was slightly late. We had to sit in awkward silence/murmuring until she arrived to introduce the play she wrote.

Kimberley who studies at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama is the in house student writer for the National Archives. She was inspired by the suffragette documents held at the National Archives, (she researched through these documents to write a play - very impressive!!). The play she wrote is entitled: "A Presentment of Ordinary Women: A Suffragette play for the twenty-first century." My male friend (the one I mentioned earlier) played a character named George, the stereotypical "bad guy" "typically sexist" man of the 1910's. However, although I am a bit biased, his performance was the best part of the play.

Whilst the performance was 'playing out' I did not realize that the characters were based on real people [with their names - specifically Constance played by Mauricia (she also was quite good - projected well since there were no microphones for the actors)] rather than a fictional play (fictional characters) based on real life events. I did not become aware of this fact until after the event, in which we got to see the original documents that Kimberley as well as the other students used for reference.

I quite enjoyed the play, the lighting and sound was a bit off at some points, but the content and performances were well researched and presented.

The next part of the event was the introduction to "Suffrage Tales" the short film made by 14 students aged 16-19 who had responded to the National Archives project. These students also used the suffragette files provided by the National Archives and each produced a short segment that went into the short film. This short film was made in just a week's time (an impressive feat) with the help of several education officers at the archives as well as Nigel Kellaway (film-maker) and Kate Sullivan. Each student was directly informed by these records to create their own version of stop-motion film. None of these students were previously either historians or filmmakers, but had interest in both subjects (an interesting fact to me, bringing unlikely groups together and creating something worthwhile for the centenary).

During this introduction the same speaker from before brought two of the students up to introduce the film, if I had thought the awkward silence before was bad, I was not prepared for this part. One of two students (1 male, 1 female) the male student in particular, gave me the worst awkward/2nd hand embarrassment of the night. It was most likely not anyone's fault, but this student clearly was not comfortable with speaking in front of people (his answers were typically yes/no or one sentence replies). I just have to say it wasn't a pleasant experience probably for everyone involved. The other student was obviously more comfortable (using the microphone properly, using more than one sentence replies etc...). I did feel a little bad for the male student to be quite honest. However after those gruelling 15 minutes, the short film began.

This is the highlight of the event/night. The short film itself was around 15 minutes long, content filled (and engaging I might add) with a short segment from each student. The team of students was also relatively equal in terms of gender/sex from what I could see, which was a nice consideration. I will link it below for everyone to see as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETP-J5X-hJE&ab_channel=TheNationalArchivesUK

It was also nice to see before and after the main event (within the auditorium) all of the 'props'/displays used for the short film, as previously mentioned.

After the film screening, there were gifts/acknowledgements announced and given out. Each of the students received a certificate and an official DVD of the short film. The education advisors as well as Kimberley also received a bouquet of flowers each (all of these education advisors were women FYI).

The next part of the event was the document display, where the documents that inspired the play and film were showcased in the learning space of the archives (a small room, table in U shape and you walked around). This was very exciting to see, the actual documents referenced in the film now in front of you to view. One of my friends would have liked to have more time to actually handle the documents, however this was not allowed at this time or in this venue. However I found the format appropriate, it definitely got you interested in the content that was used, and for me at least enticed me to want to come back and find the papers again, or papers like these to look through.

This then led to the close of the event at 19:30. After the event the two friends that I had brought, plus myself, my friend who invited me to the event, the rest of the actors and their significant others, as well as a few others went to the nearby pub to get drinks and chat/talk to each other. I met a lot of new people this night, and they were all very lovely. We got to talk not only about the play they performed, but also their work and struggles going into the workforce (what bonded us - mutual lack of prospectives and complaining about it for one), as well as movies (something I could talk about for a long time).

*Side-note - the play made me think of the movie "Suffragette" that came out last year*

As a whole, this event/night was very fun, entertaining, educational and inspirational. These students, not necessarily having backgrounds in history/archival research, or filmmaking produced a great project for the centenary of the right to vote for women. This is important, not only because it gets young people involved in things they wouldn't necessarily be involved in, in their everyday lives, but also highlighting untold stories of women and their struggle, that are not only relevant in terms of anniversary, but themes still apparent in today's society (specifically women's right to vote).

As always... see ya later gals!