A Mad, Burning Desire

“A Mad, Burning Desire” highlights the extraordinary accomplishments of the first English actresses who gained the legal right to take the public stage in the early 1660s. Many of these women capitalized on early modern society’s fascination with mental illness and catapulted themselves to fame by portraying characters who descended violently into lovesick madness on the Restoration stage. Paula Maust (harpsichord) and Malina Rauschenfels (soprano) will take audiences far beyond the music through engaging dialogues about the ways the perception of mental health issues in the early modern period is directly related to contemporary stigmas.