Talkin' Broadway Regional News & Reviews: San Francisco - "It's True, It's True, It's True"

Regional Reviews: San Francisco/North Bay

It's True, It's True, It's True
Marin Theatre
Review by Patrick Thomas

Also see Patrick's review of Simple Mexican Pleasures

Keiko Shimosato Carreiro and Maggie Mason
Photo by David Allen

There is, oh so sadly, no shortage of stories of women raped or abused by powerful men, only to learn that when they tell their stories, they are not believed or–worse still–are themselves blamed for provoking the attack. E. Jean Carroll, the victims of Harvey Weinstein, Anita Hill, and many, many others have had their accusations brushed aside or ignored. Most sexual assaults go unreported, and even when a woman presses charges or files a civil suit, she is often subjected to a different sort of assault.

In It's True, It's True, It's True, which this weekend in Marin Theatre's intimate Lieberman Theatre in a production created by Breach, a theatre company based in the UK, we travel over four centuries back in time to witness the trial of Agostino Tassi, accused of raping 17-year old Artemisia Gentileschi, a woman who would go on to achieve fame as a painter at a time when very few women were able to pursue careers in the arts.

The play, written by Billy Barrett and Ellice Stevens, relies heavily on actual court transcripts from Tassi's 1612 trial. Much of the dialogue is taken directly from those documents, but also interweaves Bible stories that inspired some of Gentileschi's most powerful works, including "Judith slaying Holofernes" and "Susanna and the Elders."

It's True, It's True, It's True, performed by an all-female cast (Emily Anderson, Keiko Shimosato Carreiro, Alicia M. P. Nelson, and Maggie Mason), hews closely to the court transcripts, but with an undercurrent of righteous anger, expressed through Riot Grrrl-style punk music, which peppers the show with a stripped-down sound featuring a single guitar and a very small drum kit. As the show opens, one of the cast makes her appearance wearing a pink balaclava, similar to those worn by the Russian protest band Pussy Riot.

Gentileschi's tale, despite being 400+ years removed, feels (again, sadly) all too contemporary. Audiences will have no trouble identifying with the story of a young woman who was under the tutelage of an older man–Tassi was her painting teacher–who abuses their relationship. After all, it's estimated that 80-90% of rape victims knew their assailant prior to the assault.

It's True, It's True, It's True takes the audience through some of the horrific details of the attack, including the torture to which Gentileschi was subjected as a sort of Baroque polygraph to test the veracity of her claims. It is a testament to the power of Gentileschi's core humanity that she was able to speak her truth clearly and plainly, especially since she lived in a time where the remedy for crimes such as this was to have the attacker marry his victim–something Tassi evidently promised, but reneged upon.

The cast is excellent, exhibiting tremendous fearlessness in tackling such a sensitive subject and stripping away any pretense of shame. Through both the transcribed testimony and the raw emotion of the music they perform, they–under the direction of Rebecca Wear–inhabit this story with an abandon that forces us to stare into the abyss of abuse and see the scars it leaves. It's True, It's True, It's True is s story both timely and timeless.

It's True, It's True, It's True runs through May 4, 2025, at Marin Theatre, Lieberman Theatre, 397 Miller Avenue, Mill Valley CA. Performances are Tuesdays-Saturdays at 7:30pm, with matinees Saturdays and Sundays at 2:00pm. Tickets range from $47-$81. For tickets and information, please visit www.marintheatre.org or call 415-388-5208.