WARRIOR QUEENS, Footsteps Theatre Company. In a program note, director Sandy Borglum says that one of the goals of Warrior Queens is for us “to meet some forgotten, kick-ass women.” One assumes she’s playing fast and loose with her phraseology: at least three of the women featured in this historical collage–Margaret Thatcher, Catherine the Great, and Geraldine Ferraro–are far from forgotten. And though she brings to the stage many lesser-known ass kickers (like India’s Rani Lakshmibai, Britain’s Boadicea, and Vietnam’s Trung sisters), she never allows us to “meet” any of them. Instead we get two-sentence introductions full of broad generalizations (“Zenobia interfered with Rome’s trade routes”), then a lot of stylized movement and hollow poetic declarations that typically degenerate into halfhearted stage combat.
