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Showing posts with the label Wendy Wasserstein

The Heidi Chronicles

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The late, great Wendy Wasserstein 's seminal work, The Heidi Chronicles , was something of a revelation when it debuted off-Broadway at Playwrights Horizons. It won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1989, and once it transferred to Broadway, the play won the Tony Award for Best Play. Through the experiences of Heidi Holland ( Elisabeth Moss ), an art historian coming of age in the 60s, Wasserstein explored one view of the feminist movement, and where its progenitors ended up. (Through a series of vignettes, we see Heidi as an adolescent in 1965, and then check in with her over the years, all the way through 1989.) Seeing how relevant this is—how little has changed—is somewhat disappointing. Maybe it's not fair to say nothing has changed. Maybe a lot has, and what hasn't is simply amplified because of changes in technology. There are still institutional blockades against women, and women are still stigmatized for their choices (when the old, wrinkly men who write laws let...