Historic Witch Trials Influence Modern America in ‘Becky Nurse of Salem’ From Shattered Globe Theatre: Review

Marc Vitali | October 16, 2024, 5:59 pm

Linda Reiter in Shattered Globe Theatre’s “Becky Nurse of Salem.” (Credit: Liz Lauren)

It’s a potent brew of humor and fury, love potions and Boston accents.

In “Becky Nurse of Salem,” contemporary conflicts echo the witch trials of 17th century New England, and every character in the play feels the impact of history.

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Despite its breezy title, “Becky Nurse of Salem” is a full-blown tempest of irony and righteous anger. It ponders the witch as both a powerful being and an object of scorn. Here, witches can be genuine or kooky – sometimes all in the same witch.

The play tells the story of a tour guide at the Salem Museum of Witchcraft who struggles to defend herself against persecution in an unfair world.

Her name is Becky Nurse, and she is a descendant of Rebecca Nurse, a real 71-year-old woman arrested for witchcraft in 1692 on flimsy charges. The ancestral Nurse was hanged from a gallows that stood at the current site of a Walgreens… unless it was over by the Dunkin Donuts.

“Becky Nurse of Salem” is the Midwest premiere of a 2022 play by Sarah Ruhl, MacArthur Fellow and Chicago native.

The story begins as the Obama-era is ending. Becky loses her job and seeks relief at a local bar, where voices on TV news holler “Lock her up!” She tunes out the mob, even as it foreshadows her own fate.

In Becky’s hometown of Salem, it’s Halloween all year long. It’s a place without much opportunity but plenty of franchises and opioids. For Becky, the town she couldn’t escape from has become a place to survive, to raise a granddaughter and to hope for love.

Linda Reiter and the cast of Shattered Globe Theatre’s “Becky Nurse of Salem.” (Credit: Liz Lauren)

As Becky, actor Linda Reiter is strong, vulnerable, funny and mad as hell. The character she plays is what you might call a piece of work, and Reiter’s Becky is genuinely sympathetic in her search for affection. You ache for her as you laugh at her slightly warped perspective.

The play is bursting at the seams with ideas and material, and it veers off in some surprising directions as it considers the uses and abuses of witchcraft and power.

For instance: there’s an unusual take on Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible” that might drop some jaws. Basically the playwright lays out evidence that Miller’s great play was skewed by his lust for Marilyn Monroe. It is quite an indictment.

The cast of seven can conjure a coven or a jury. There are solid impressions from the young couple in the cast (Isabella Maria Valdés and Diego Rivera-Rodriguez) and Becky’s love interest, Bob (Ramón Camín). Becky and Bob’s scene of attraction while falling under a spell is irresistible.

This darkly comic work is directed by Polly Noonan who, like the playwright, is an alum of the Piven Theatre Workshop. The production features a set that divides the audience in two – with one set of seats across the stage from the other. It looks good, but the staging obscures the action behind the screens on either side.

“Becky Nurse of Salem” is a provocative play about legacy and reckoning. It will give you a lot to talk about, think about, and laugh about should you set your alarm for the witching hour.

Shattered Globe Theatre’s production of “Becky Nurse of Salem” is playing at Theater Wit on 1229 West Belmont Ave. through Nov. 16.