Machinal

A woman. A husband. A life that was never hers to choose.Helen is expected to do what women have always been told to do. Find a man. Get married. Have children. Be a good wife. Be grateful.
But what happens when the life everyone expects you to lead becomes a machine you cannot escape?First performed in 1928, Sophie Treadwell's Machinal is a powerful, unsettling expressionist drama about a woman caught in a world that has already decided who she should be. As Helen struggles against the relentless machinery of marriage, motherhood and societal expectation, her desperate search for freedom takes a devastating turn.Inspired by the notorious murder trial of Ruth Snyder, Machinal is a play written in anger. Told through nine intensely stylised episodes, its world is one of relentless voices, mechanical rhythms and mounting tension, where the individual is crushed beneath the weight of expectation.Nearly a century after it was written, Treadwell's extraordinary play remains as provocative as ever.The machine keeps turning. But what happens when someone refuses to be another part of it?