WVAC: Ghislaine

Why does a victim become a predator? Why, and how, can Ghislaine Maxwell maintain her innocence whilst the world understands more clearly the depths to which she, Epstein and those around them built and benefited from a network of abuse.

Alone in her cell, refuting her guilty verdict, Ghislaine unravels: reliving the psychological abuse endured from her father and clinging to the fantasy and the terrifying reality of herself. As charismatic, beautiful and above all manipulative monster in female form.

How does complicity become identity and why does a woman’s capacity for cruelty still feel so shocking? If men have been permitted and even encouraged, to become monsters in plain sight, what does it mean when a woman becomes one too and why does she so often become the story’s final container for blame?

This is a work in progress reading*, written and performed by Kristin Winters, with original music by Alexey Kochetkov. 

Ghislaine - is an exploration of privilege, entitlement and the desire to control another human’s fate, alongside the lives that are left carrying the consequences long after the headlines move on. 

*A version, previously called Ghislaine/Gabler, was performed in 2022 - whilst there will be similarities in this piece it has been significantly reworked, removing Hedda Gabler from the narrative and focusing more on the present day.