The Revolt of Mother
by Mary E Wilkins FreemanGenre: Comedy
Setting:
Format of Original Source: Short Story
Recommended Adaptation Length: 90 Minutes
Candidate for Adaptation? Promising
EXCERPT:
Sarah Penn went back and stood before her husband. “Now, father,” said she, “I want to know if you think you’re doin’ right an’ accordin’ to what you profess. Here, when we was married, forty year ago, you promised me faithful that we should have a new house built in that lot over in the field before the year was out. You said you had money enough, an’ you wouldn’t ask me to live in no such place as this. It is forty year now, an’ you’ve been makin’ more money, an’ I’ve been savin’ of it for you ever sence, an’ you ain’t built no house yet. You’ve built sheds an’ cow-houses an’ one new barn, an’ now you’re goin’ to build another. Father, I want to know if you think it’s right. You’re lodgin’ your dumb beasts better than you are your own flesh an’ blood. I want to know if you think it’s right.”
A surprisingly strong feministic statement for 1891 about a farmer’s wife who stands her ground against her husband. He has promised to built her a new home, and she has been patient for forty years. But when he starts building a new barn instead of a home, she revolts. It’s quaint, but if you can establish the time period, it could actually be rather powerful and symbolic. The action itself is slight, however, and as it stands would fill only a fifteen-minute show. With the invention of some other events (which would stand for the battleground between husband and wife — which ones is she willing to compromise on, and which will she stand unerringly firm on?), this might possibly stretch to a full-length.
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