Strange Beauty ; Ina an Exclusive Interview, Theatre Director Richard Eyre Tells Sue Corrigan About Stage Beauty, His Lavish New Film On Love, Art and Cross-Dressing in the 17th Century

Summary

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In the middle of the 17th century, actor Edward 'Ned' Kynaston was the most famous stage star of his day, packing London's theatres with his many adoring fans. Indeed, the diarist Samuel Pepys raved about him after seeing him in a performance of Shakespeare's Othello.

But there was a twist at the time Kynaston was appearing as the tragic heroine Desdemona. With women forbidden by law from acting, men played all the female parts, and no one played them better than the beautiful, bisexual Kynaston. So beautiful, indeed, that Pepys praised him on the night he watched him perform as 'the prettiest woman in the whole house'.

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Strange Beauty ; Ina an Exclusive Interview, Theatre Director Richard Eyre Tells Sue Corrigan About Stage Beauty, His Lavish New Film On Love, Art and Cross-Dressing in the 17th Century

Then, overnight, everything changed.

With King Charles II suddenly decreeing that women's parts should be played only by women, Kynaston found himself on the scrap heap not only as an actor, but also as a human being. What does a man, trained since childhood to think, move and behave like a woman, do when he is replaced by the real thing?

In the hands of Richard Eyre,...

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