“The Playwright, Jyl Bonaguro, is a well regarded sculptor in Chicago who has brought her sense of style and artistry to her writing. The play deals with historical characters accurately while addressing contemporary culture and far reaching feminist issues of today.”
– Jeffrey Ortmann International Arts Alliance
“Bonaguro’s play explores the full spectrum of Châtelet’s life, emphasizing her work in the sciences and her increasingly turbulent personal relationship with Voltaire—a relationship that both freed and destroyed her.”
– Chicago Artist Resource
“Lincoln Park-based visual artist Jyl Bonaguro read a biography about an 18th century French woman whose story she couldn’t shake.”
– DNA Info Chicago
Urania, A new play on the Life of Emilie Du Châtelet
The life of a female intellectual largely forgotten by history emerges in a new play by Jyl Bonaguro. Urania plunges us back into 18th-century France, where courtly manners were strict and scientific reasoning was the new vogue. It portrays how, after falling in love with Voltaire, Du Châtelet transformed from a social dilettante into one of Europeʼs leading scientific minds. Considered scandalous by many, she still managed to publish works on physics, mathematics and even the subject of happiness. Her crowning achievement was a translation of Isaac Newton’s Principia Mathematica with an original commentary. Completed just 6 days prior to her untimely death at age 43, it is still the only complete French translation of Newton available today. Brushed aside by history, Du Châtelet is only recently being recognized as contributing to famous formulas like E=mc2. Unlike the generally more lighthearted dramatic adaptations of her story to date, Urania takes a modern comedic approach that balances her unsung achievements with the nuances of her relationships and the constraints of 18th century attitudes towards women. Learn more about Emilie Du Châtelet
Jesse Hutson, Katy Werlin, Elise Soeder as Gossips Nathan Ducker as Voltaire & Ellen Dunphy as Emilie Du Chatelet – photography by Tuan H. Bui