TCU professor Krista Scott performed 15 shows in 16 days as the sole actress in her original one-woman play, “Wilde Women.”
Scott only got 90 minutes of preparation to tech the show and load in the entire set at at the world’s largest theatre festival, the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, last month. The play received rave reviews.
“Wilde Women,” written by Scott, tells the story of actress Lillie Langtry’s rise to fame. The play takes place in Langtry’s dressing room in the hours following a successful show as she awaits a telegram from her friend, renowned author Oscar Wilde. Langtry, feeling uninspired, believes she needs to write more material for herself as age catches up with her successful acting career.
“I was enchanted from the moment Lillie Langtry entered the dressing room to tell us about her idea for a new show playing the very best of Oscar Wilde’s leading ladies,” Stagewright Production wrote in a five-star review. “My only regret, when it ended.”
The Edinburgh Festival Fringe
Edinburgh, Scotland, became home to performers from 68 countries during the three-week festival. The Edinburgh Festival Fringe boasted 2.6 million ticket sales across 53,942 performances.
“It’s a nut house there,” Scott said. “The entire city of Edinburgh is taken over by this theater festival.”
The festival was originally created to boost morale and celebrate European culture following World War II. The festival quickly grew and became an official society, continuing as an annual event since then.
The making of “Wilde Women”
Scott’s story of “Wilde Women” mirrors her own experiences creating the play. In 2016, Scott conceived the idea for a one-woman show.
“As actresses get older, there are fewer roles,” Scott said. “I thought to myself, ‘I need to create my own vehicles, create my own art.'”
Scott had the opportunity to direct Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest” through TCU Theater in 2017. During that production, her research for her own work never stopped.
“I appreciate Wilde’s rhetoric and humor, so I started looking into his materials, and all that research fed into Wilde Women,” she said.
Scott presented previews of “Wilde Women” at TCU, directed by TCU faculty member Jennifer Engler, before bringing it to Edinburgh.
“My intention was to bring it to the fringe in 2020, Scott said. Then COVID-19 struck. Five years later, while on sabbatical, the journey finally took form in Edinburgh.
Due to its popularity, Scott performed a weekend of shows and held a Q&A at TCU in the Marlene and Spencer Hays Theatre earlier this month.
