Valley of the dolls house.

Summary: Since 1981, the Split Britches Company (founded by Lois Weaver, Peggy Shaw, and Deb Margolin, www.splitbritches.com) has written and performed in trio, duet, and solo, as well as collaborated and performed with other artists. They describe their work in this way: 'Our work is rooted in popular culture, but positioned against it. It relies on moments rather than plot, relationships rather than story. It depends on the surprise of transformation rather than the logic of psychological narrative. It straddles the line between performance and theater, exploiting theatricality while exposing the pretense. It is about a community of outsiders, queers, eccentrics. It is feminist because it encourages the imaginative potential in everyone and lesbian because it takes the presence of lesbian on stage as a given.' Their vaudevillian satirical gender-bending performances have received numerous awards, including a Jane Chamber award and four Village Voice OBIE awards. Their collection of scripts, Split Britches Feminist Performance/Lesbian Practice, edited by Sue Ellen Case, won the 1997 Lambda Literary Award for Drama. This video documents their show Valley of the Dolls House, created in residency with 26 students from the University of Hawaii in 1997. Based on Henrik Ibsens A Doll's House and Jacqueline Susann's Valley of the Dolls, the piece is a celebration of difference and a critique of whiteness set in the uniquely multicultural city of Honolulu that is both besieged by and dependent on a tacky tourist trade.

Credits: Split Britches, producer ; Lois Weaver, director, writer ; Peggy Shaw, Deb Margolin, writers ; University of Hawaii students, collaborative creation.

Credits: Lois Weaver, Peggy Shaw, Deb Margolin, University of Hawaii performance class.