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Carol Rosegg ©2025  MICHAEL MEDEIROS as FRANCOIS-MARIE AROUET De VOLTAIRE AMY LYNN STEWART as GABRIELLE EMILIE Le TONNELIER De BRETEUIL

Onstage was a large, white, gleaming, beautiful 18th-century bathtub. I immediately found myself looking forward to equal-opportunity nudity. After all, wasn’t this new play by Arthur Giron called “Emilie’s Voltaire”“ And wasn’t it subtitled “An 18th Century Sexual Symphony” “ and, “A True Story”?

Alas, no. No bodice ripping, no bedding down, and sadly, not a lot of chemistry between the main characters, Voltaire (Michael Medeiros) and Emilie (Amy Stewart). However, this is not their fault: the text and the production did not give them the opportunity for chemistry: at least, not the physical kind. Why, there was barely a kiss between them!

Carol Rosegg ©2025  

The writer Voltaire met the married Emilie Marquise Du Chatelet-Laumont when he was 39 and she 27. She was hungry for knowledge, a “dumb aristocrat,” and desired to be mentored in science more than anything else. Voltaire, attracted by first her beauty and eventually her brain, saw a match of equals, something he never had before. They lived together for 16 years (while Emilie’s husband, a general, was rarely at home). When she was 43, she became pregnant (not by Voltaire). She died soon after the birth and so did the child. Voltaire went on to live another 29, producing 80 volumes of writing, including 60 plays, in his lifetime.

Giron’s play begins with their first meeting, in 1733. The lights come up, and in the bath, in a nightgown, is Voltaire, writing and narrating in the third person. But he is not a man of 39; Medeiros looks to be in his 50s, which turns the story into a May-December romance rather than a potential meeting of equals. To be fair, Medeiros has very recently stepped into the role when another actor dropped out, so he cannot be faulted. Medeiros certainly has the flamboyance and flair of Voltaire, and his self-importance is right at the front of his performance. But the text eventually reduces him to a whining cuckold, and that is baffling, as for the most part I had no idea whether these two people were sexual or celibate. When Emilie complains, in their later years, that Voltaire has grown cold toward her, it’s hard to understand what was lost, because we have seen almost no tenderness or loving in their relationship. Amy Lynn Stewart’s magnificent Emilie is more than a match for Voltaire, in wit, looks and drive. She knows exactly what she wants and controls their relationship from the very beginning.

Much of Act II is reduced to domestic squabbling about various household bits, and the message seems to be that a woman’s learning makes for much unhappiness at home. That’s too bad, because Giron has some great lines: when Emilie grows tired of bickering, she says, “The wittiest man in Europe is not funny at home.” When Voltaire accuses Emilie of doing too much shopping, she says, “I support the porcelain industry.” In Act I, when Voltaire declares his love for Emilie, she replies, “People in my circle don’t speak of love. Unless they are lying. Then it is acceptable.” That’s getting very close to Oscar Wilde’s company; however, it cannot sustain a play.

The trouble with trying to dramatize learning is that it is not inherently theatrical. This play has too much talk, and too little action. Adventures mostly happen offstage, not on, as when Emilie disguises herself as a man and goes into town. Act II is played almost entirely in Emilie’s bedroom: if I were trapped in there for the last seven years of a relationship, I’d be unhappy, too.