Creating Fringe Shows Based on Historical Figures with Shelley Cooper
- What the Fringe?!
- Apr 17
- 3 min read
S1E23 of What the Fringe?!
Shelley Cooper has earned recognition in the Fringe theater world for her ability to bring historical figures to life through compelling solo performances. Her works, La Divina: The Last Interview of Maria Callas and Jenny Lind Presents P.T. Barnum, merge storytelling, music, and careful research to offer audiences a deeper, more nuanced understanding of iconic women whose legacies have often been shaped by myth rather than fact.
What I’m trying to do with Maria Callas and Jenny Lind is tell their stories truthfully. These women were brilliant and complex, not the one-dimensional characters history or Hollywood sometimes makes them out to be.
Exploring the Lives of Iconic Artists
La Divina focuses on the legendary soprano Maria Callas, presented through a fictional interview. The show explores her survival during World War II, her rise to international fame, and her personal struggles, including her complex relationship with Aristotle Onassis. Cooper avoids the caricature of Callas as an arrogant diva, instead revealing her as a determined, gifted artist navigating personal and professional challenges.
Jenny Lind Presents P.T. Barnum examines the “Swedish Nightingale” during her headline-making American tour. Unlike the romanticized portrayal in The Greatest Showman, Cooper’s version shows Lind as a principled artist who ultimately challenged Barnum over his aggressive publicity and questionable ethics. The work delves into the political and moral climate of the time, especially the tensions over slavery, offering audiences a historically grounded portrait that often surprises them.
Cooper's Journey From Thesis to Stage
Cooper’s interest in creating shows based on historical figures began during her MFA studies in Orlando, where she discovered Fringe festivals and their creative freedom. The spark for La Divina came when she decided to write her graduate thesis as a solo show about Callas, inspired by recordings and interviews that revealed the singer’s emotional depth. Years later, Jenny Lind emerged after a review of La Divina compared Cooper’s performance to seeing Lind in her prime, leading her to research Lind’s real story and uncover historical details rarely portrayed on stage.
Her process is rooted in thorough research. She studies archival materials, listens to original recordings, and examines the historical and cultural context surrounding each figure. Cooper also focuses on how these women’s stories have been altered over time, often reframing them to counter incomplete or inaccurate portrayals.
She advises other artists interested in historical storytelling to set clear deadlines for readings, seek input from trusted advisors, and remain open to reworking material as new information or perspectives emerge. She emphasizes that it is important to balance authenticity with compelling narrative structure, ensuring the story resonates with both audiences familiar with the subject and those encountering the figure for the first time.
Reimagining History Through Fringe
Cooper’s work shows that creating shows about historical figures can be both artistically rewarding and challenging. It demands accuracy, empathy, and a willingness to confront popular misconceptions. Through her performances, she demonstrates how Fringe theater can be a platform for reclaiming and reimagining history, giving audiences not just entertainment but a more truthful connection to the past.
Since appearing on What the Fringe?! Cooper has developed and produced a third historically based play, Rag Doll on a Bomb Site, the story of Lotte Lenya, who originated the role of Jenny Diver in The Threepenny Opera.
This blog post was inspired by S1 E23 of the What the Fringe?! podcast, and was written utilizing AI technology, in conjunction with human oversight and editing.
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