Contemporary Scottish Theatre

1
Contemporary Scottish TheatreThe Steamie Tony
Roper

• Introduction to the play

2
Contemporary Scottish Theatre

• The play The Steamie will be studied as part of
  CST element of the course.
• It will be a play which you will have to
  reference in the CST essay in your exam.
• The Steamie can be discussed under the question
  selections Social, Political and Religious
  Dimensions, Use of History, Nostalgia and Popular
  Tradition and Issues of Gender.

3
Historical setting of the play

• The play is set in 1953, just before the slum
  clearances of Urban Regeneration (poor housing
  was being knocked down in cities throughout
  Britain and other towns were being created to
  house people).
•  
• The joy of better housing brought with it a
  feeling of displacement and alienation for many
  people, especially the older generation.
•  
• Old communities were being destroyed and within
  a very short time, as is often the case after any
  major social upheaval, people found comfort in
  remembering or imagining The good old
  days..This is represented mainly through the
  character of Mrs Culfeathers.
•  
• The play is set in the 50s but was written in
  the 80s by Tony Roper.
•  
• This is a play which studies women at work but
  more specifically the womens relationships and
  lifestyle in the 1940s and early 50s. It is a
  play exploring personal relationships in a
  working environment.

4
Historical setting of the play

• The main developments in the last 45 years of
  industrial society have led to increasing
  separation of people in their homes, family
  groups and during their leisure time. The
  occasions for social exchange are much fewer.
• The Steamie was a place women could socialise
  as well as do their washing. It was like a weekly
  club where information and gossip was exchanged.
  None the less it was a chore and not
  recreational!
•  
• It was also a necessity as there was no hot
  water, washing machines, baths or tumble dryers
  in the home.
•  
• The washing was often transported to The
  Steamie in prams, very few people had cars.
•  
• In the course of the heavy work, the chat and
  the gossip helped pass the time.

5
Historical setting of the play

• Social status was often defined by whether or
  not a man was in employment and the type of
  employment he was in.
•  
• Respectability was often gauged by the degree of
  cleanliness of the house and the people in it.
•  
• The National Health Service was established in
  1948, this provided some benefits for people, but
  this was very broken up and people still
  struggled.
•  
• The play is set in the past, a recent history,
  but still the past and many elements of lifestyle
  have changed since then.

6
Synopsis

•  
• The play begins on New Years eve. The women are
  all trying to get their washing done to get home
  to celebrate. We are introduced to each of the
  characters and their various personalities. We
  find out about their lifestyles, backgrounds,
  families and working days.
• There are many songs in the play, which
  compliment and add to the themes and issues
  raised in the play. These are also used to tell
  some of the women's stories and give the audience
  an insight into their feelings.
• We meet one male character, the supervisor -
  Andy. He raises issues of the womens opinions of
  men and the role of men in society at the time
  the play was written. There are many comical
  moments in the play and humour is used throughout
  the play.

7
The Steamie

• Click HERE to see images of an original Steamie.
• Click HERE to see some video clips of the play
  The Steamie.
• Click HERE to see an interview with Tony Roper.

8
The CharactersMrs Molly Culfeathers

• She is in her late 60s and remembers the good
  old days.
• She is working harder than ever as she has an
  ill husband and has to keep the house going
  herself. She has two sons and three
  grandchildren, who live in England and whom she
  never sees, obviously giving her little support.
• She has been working in the Steamie for six
  hours on Hogmanay. She does washing for others to
  make money.
• She is a naive character who misses a lot of the
  jokes but who has the respect of the others, due
  to her age and her sheer hard work. Dolly
  particularly supports her.

9
The CharactersMagrit McGuire

• She is in her late 30s, her life revolves around
  her husband Peter and her children.
• She sees the harshness of her life. She is
  cynical and has a hard life. She can be impatient
  with those she sees as weaker, as in Dolly and
  Mrs Culfeathers.
• However, we do discover that there is a softer
  side to her as she respects her elders and
  apologises to Mrs Culfeathers for shouting at
  her. She also sticks up for Dolly when she is in
  the sink.
• She is a working class woman (as they all are)
  and she sums up the role of women and tenement
  life in the 50s with her song Isnt it
  wonderful to be a woman.

10
The CharactersDoreen Hood

• She is 19 and has her whole life ahead of her,
  with the promise of a new house in Drumchapel
  with her husband John.
• She is fashion conscious and aware of the trends
  of the day. She knows about the latest household
  gadgets etc.
• She aims to have a better life than the women of
  previous generations (ironic as Drumchapel, is
  different now from what she envisaged).

11
The CharactersDolly Johnson

• She is in her late 50s and has a grown up
  family.
• She likes to have a laugh and a joke and is quite
  naive about life.
• She is prepared to use the Steamie for purposes
  beyond washing e.g. a wash bath and washing
  greasy overalls.
• She likes to be of help to others. She likes
  conversation and goes along with others,
  especially Mrs Culfeathers with the story about
  mince and the imaginary telephone conversation
  with Doreen.

12
Discussing The Steamie

• The Steamie can be useful to mention in a
  social question. The next slide highlights some
  areas you could prepare quotes and examples for
  when discussing the play.

13
The Steamie
14
The Steamie

• On the following slides you will find some basic
  notes to help you to start thinking of creating
  your own quotes and examples to illustrate the
  social conditions represented in the play.

15
Social Conditions

• The play is a social play looking at community
  spirit in Glasgow, which existed before the urban
  clearances.
•  
• Songs were added to Ropers script, some of
  these have an element of social comment.
•  
• There is no bigotry or sectarianism in this
  play. Magrit is the only Catholic and references
  are made to her religion in a curious way.
•  
• The location of The Steamie is vital in
  revealing the social issues. People had no
  amenities in their own houses and had to use The
  Steamie.
•  
• We do learn about working class life through the
  dialogue.
•  
• The women were from a close knit community,
  where everyone new generations of each others
  families and more so each others business.
•  

16
Social Conditions

• Sense of community is also conveyed in the way
  they help each other e.g. Dolly helping Mrs
  Culfeathers and inviting her to her Hogmanay
  party.
• The fear of losing community is also brought up
  in the play through the character of Mrs
  Culfeathers.
•  
• Roper highlights the poor health, specifically
  of Mrs Culfeathers, she is tired and feels shes
  finished but has to work in order to survive.
•  
• By looking at the social conditions of the time,
  we learn that people received very little help
  financially from the government.
•  
• Women accepted that their role was in the house
  and that any job would be purely domesticated.
•  
• The women, apart from Doreen, have no
  aspirations, they have accepted their fate.
•  
• The men obviously did manual work (the
  overalls).
• Roper uses colloquial language to set the play
  in the period, but also to reveal the social
  class.

17
The Steamie

• The play can also be discussed in the Issues of
  Gender essay questions. The next slide
  highlights some areas you could prepare quotes
  and examples for when discussing the play.

18
The Steamie
19
The Steamie

• On the following slides you will find some basic
  notes to help you to start thinking of creating
  your own quotes and examples to illustrate the
  Issues of Gender represented in the play.

20
Issues of Gender

•  
• Magrits song Wonderful to be a woman sums up
  the womens place in society as wives, mothers,
  grandmothers and as cooks, cleaners, laundry
  maids unpaid skivvies.
•  
• Their lives are hard and their working days are
  long, they have little, if no time to themselves.
•  
• The women talk about their roles and their
  relationships, quite often in a negative manner.
• The women mainly speak negatively about their
  husbands.
•  
• The women are the central characters.
•  

21
Issues of Gender

• Some critics have views that the characters are
  stereotypical.
•  
• However, as the play progresses the characters
  seem to have more depth and wider experience than
  intimated at the outset.
•  
• Doreen, representing the younger generation, is
  the only woman who has ambitions to create a
  better way of life for herself. She seeks the
  new technology and keeps up with fashion. She
  also has a different relationship with her
  husband and has experienced things that the other
  woman have not heard of.
•  
• The character of Andy is in a position of status
  because of his job, but the women gain the upper
  hand as the play progresses. They do however end
  up looking after Andy as he is drunk, a situation
  most of the women, particularly Magrit, is used
  to with her own husband.

22
The Steamie

• The play can also be discussed in the History,
  Nostalgia and Popular Tradition essay questions.
  The next slide highlights some areas you could
  prepare quotes and examples for when discussing
  the play.

23
The Steamie
24
The Steamie
25
The Steamie

• On the following slides you will find some basic
  notes to help you to start thinking of creating
  your own quotes and examples to illustrate the
  elements of History, Nostalgia and Popular
  Tradition represented in the play.

26
History, Nostalgia and Popular Tradition

• Ropers reconstruction of the late 40s and
  early 50s working class life is historically
  accurate.
•  
• The lives the women lead were just as they would
  have been at the time.
•  
• Their memories, however have a rose coloured
  tint. Life at the turn of the century must have
  been hard and full of discomfort, but there is no
  mention of dirt, cold, damp and disease that must
  have been commonplace.
•  
• Mrs Culfeathers has a romanticised view of the
  past, she is looking back on her youth, where she
  probably wasnt aware of loneliness, rather than
  that it didnt exist.
•  
• Was everything so friendly or are these memories
  selective or imagined?
•  
• The audience understand the ironic use of
  Drumchapel as a site of aspirations.
•  
• Among the popular traditions of Scotland are
  Pantomime, Variety and Music Hall. Stand-up
  comics , double acts, songs, dance and monologues
  are only a few of the popular traditions of
  theatre found in The Steamie.

27
The Steamie

• In class we will specifically look at the play in
  terms of its relevance to Social, Political and
  Religious dimensions, Issues of Gender and
  Popular Tradition.
• The next slide will give you some tasks to
  complete to help you to develop your knowledge of
  the play and prepare quotes and examples to
  answer in the above questions.

28
The SteamieTasks

1. You will be put into groups and each group will
   be given a Social heading. The group should
   prepare a presentation based on the social
   condition given. This should firstly explain the
   social condition. The presentation should be
   visual and include images. It should also include
   quotes and examples from the play, WITH
   JUSTIFICATION of the ways in which the social
   condition is highlighted.
2. In pairs you will be given Issues of Gender
   related links to The Steamie. Again, you must
   create an interesting and visual presentation to
   reflect the quotes and examples from the play
   that highlight the issues of gender.

29
Well Done!

• You have now completed revision of The Steamie