The ways in which the casting of ‘boy players’ affects the representation of gender in Shakespearean drama

Abstract

This essay explores the ways in which the casting of ‘boy players’ in Shakespearean drama challenged traditional Renaissance gender binaries, notably in The Two Gentlemen of Verona (1591), Much Ado About Nothing (1598), and Twelfth Night (1601). Shakespeare’s ‘boy players’ portraying female characters highlight the fluidity and volatility of gender on the Renaissance stage and amongst its spectators. Through an analysis of cross-dressing, dramatic irony, and theatrical devices (such as costume and hair), Shakespeare allows a complex layering of identities to form, further blurring the representation of gender. Employing a New Historicist framework, the essay draws on Jane Sharp’s The Midwives Book (1671) to showcase contemporary beliefs that gender was solely defined by anatomy. However, the existence of ‘boy players’ and their consistent shifting identities on stage, thus challenges Renaissance opinion that gender was fixed. Therefore, the casting of ‘boy players’ fundamentally blurred and destabilised traditional representations of gender, both on stage and within the Renaissance society.