THE STORY OF A REMARKABLE FEMALE SCIENTIST THAT LIVED UNDER THE SHADOW OF VOLTAIRE, PREMIERES AT Q THEATRE IN SEPTEMBER

Written, directed and with music composed by Sophie Lindsay, ÉMILIE is the world premiere of a high-energy comedy-drama about a brilliant and mostly forgotten scientist, and her great love, Voltaire.
 
Featuring some of New Zealand’s best acting talent, with an original soundtrack performed live by classical musicians Peau Halapua and Sarah Spence, ÉMILIE plays for a limited season at Auckland’s Q Theatre, 19 – 23 September 2023.
 
Paris, summer 1733. Émilie’s work has stalled and she can’t face another social event in the gossip-fuelled capital. Little does she know she is about to fall in love with a famous poet. Little does he know, he is about to meet his intellectual match – an extraordinary woman, a scientist, who will change his life forever. We invite you to step into 18th-century France, where everyone has (and should know) their place…
 
Ten years after her death, Émilie’s translation of Newton’s Principia from Latin into French was published. While it is still the main translation used today, she is either forgotten or recognised as 'the mistress’ of Voltaire, one of France’s most revered philosophers and writers.
 
“Throughout history, extraordinary women have been overshadowed by men, and not only in science. ÉMILIE prompts us to reflect on whether our attitudes have changed today. (In NZ, 10% of people think men make better leaders, the gender pay gap sits at around 9.2%, only 30% of CEOs across STEM industries are women),” says director, composer and writer Sophie Lindsay.

Sophie Lindsay has been working on this script for around seven years. In her third year at Toi Whakaari, the late Graeme Tetley (screenwriter) emailed her about a new book that might be a good subject for her solo given her French background and interest in strong female characters. The book was about a French female scientist, Émilie du Châtelet. Sophie was completely taken by this remarkable woman ahead of her time – speaking six languages, understanding the most complex of calculations at a young age, her translation of Newton's Principia. She was captivated by Émilie’s beautiful love story with one of France's most famous writers and philosophers, Voltaire. And saddened by her tragic, untimely, death in her early forties from childbirth. How was Émilie du Châtelet not more well-known?

"The problem that the recognition only goes to men [in science] has existed for an extremely long time.” – Katie Hafner, Journalist and Executive Producer of Lost Women of Science.
 
The multitalented Sophie Lindsay began composing music for the work around 2019 on piano. In 2021, she collaborated with musicians Rachel Wells and Peau Halapua to bring in strings. Peau went on to take on the role of musical director and live musician for this premiere season. She says, “Émilie’s is a story we don’t usually hear, a story of a minority, a woman’s story. It’s a hidden story like many Pasifika stories, and other minority stories. Bringing stories like Émilie’s to light changes our understanding of who we are and creates more space for many different ways of being. Sophie has written the songs and I’m using my sensibility as a Pasifika woman to weave the music through the play.”
 
“Judge me for my own merits, or lack of them, but do not look upon me as a mere appendage to [my husband] or that famed author [Voltaire]. I am in my own right a whole person." – Émilie du Châtelet.