In Harlots, playwright-producer Emma Wright has created a women’s refuge, specifically for the slandered, abused, ignored and relatively voiceless women of Shakespeare’s plays.

Offering open-ended residency, this safe space is operated by Paulina (Hannah Waterman), the indomitable noblewoman from A Winter’s Tale. Burrow-like, with tree roots winding their way across earthen walls, it’s a genuinely ‘underground’ operation. We’re deep down, insulated from the actions and decisions of men, but never quite safe. We sometimes hear their heavy stomping above. Sometimes it feels like we’re buried beneath Shakespeare’s Globe itself.

With Paulina is her queen from A Winter’s Tale, Hermione, whom Shakespeare disappears from the drama for 16 years after her husband accuses her – falsely – of having an affair which, in turn, causes her young son to die of grief.

Where did she go? Shakespeare isn’t clear, and scholars are divided. Some say she dies. Wright’s reading is that Paulina has hidden her and that, together, they have created a place where hurt can be healed away from the “temper of men”.

New Ghost Theatre’s Harlots at the Old Fitzroy. Photo © Phil Erbacher

They are joined by others: Beatrice and her beloved cousin Hero from Much Ado About Nothing, and the love-scarred Helena of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Once they get over the pure shock of arrival and into Paulina’s psychoactive blend of tea, this is a place where they can raise their voices, have their say and tell their sides of the story.

But what to do with Ophelia? A spectral presence, her grief and madness resist the language of healing that sustains the refuge. What place is there for Shakespeare’s most tragic heroine in a sanctuary designed around recovery rather than despair?

Wright’s research and thinking about the problem of Shakespeare’s women runs deep, but Harlots wears it lightly. The script blends blank verse, quotation and contemporary idiom, balancing high emotion with flashes of wry humour. Given permission to question the narratives that have defined them for centuries, each character comes alive in a new way.

Ella Prince in New Ghost Theatre’s Harlots at the Old Fitzroy. Photo © Phil Erbacher

Director Janine Watson’s production is similarly nimble despite the work’s emotional and intellectual weight. Her acting ensemble is excellent, led by Waterman as Paulina, Ella Prince as Helena and Madeline Li as Hero.

Designer Kate Deere’s earthy, root-bound aesthetic creates an evocative sense of both security and, to a lesser degree, entrapment. It reminds of Hobbiton at times, however, and I found myself wondering afterwards what a more explicitly modern setting might have offered these characters.

Viewed at a time when conversations about gender, power and historical silencing are being plastered across newspaper front pages – the show’s opening night coincided with the Sydney Swans’ first game since the explosive revelations from Melbourne – Harlots feels very much on the money.

Harlots plays at the Old Fitzroy Theatre, Woolloomooloo until 6 September.