Jeanne Syquia [Photo by Craig Schwartz]
“As I was reading the novel, there were just so many passages that jumped out to me where I thought, oh, I know that feeling, or I’ve felt that way before.”
Syquia is telling me during our conversation about the upcoming production of Jane Eyre, set to officially opening on March 29th at A Noise Within.
It might seem curious that a novel written in 1847 about an orphaned governess in Victorian England would continue to resonate powerfully with audiences in 2025. But it emphatically does. Syquia believes the character speaks directly to contemporary concerns.
“I think that it’s a very modern sensibility,” she offers, for Jane to push back “just because the world has told me in various ways that I need to behave a certain way or sound a certain way or look a certain way or check off certain boxes.”
That modern sensibility she references has become a cultural flashpoint in recent years—the pushback against rigid categorization of identity, the rejection of traditional boxes that society provides for self-definition.
“But we live in a time where people are saying, ‘Hey, why do we have to — I don’t actually have to check off those boxes,” Syquia observes,
“My experience is bigger than those boxes.”
This reading of Jane Eyre—not merely as a Gothic romance or a period bildungsroman, but as a radical text about self-determination—has gained traction in recent years. But Syquia’s interpretation feels particularly thoughtful because she approaches Jane not as an icon or a symbol, but as a human being negotiating impossible circumstances.
“I’ve been trying to not think about her as such an iconic or well-known character, or a beloved book, or anything like that,” Syquia explains. “I’ve been trying to think about her more as a human being who is making her way through the world, and what is it like to be in this human being’s shoes, and what is it like to see the world through her eyes?”
When Jane declares her equality to Rochester in the play—a moment Syquia refers to later in our conversation—the line vibrates with contemporary relevance. This perspective on the character—not as a literary artifact but as a woman asserting her full humanity—informs Syquia’s entire approach to the role.
What particularly intrigues Syquia about Jane Eyre is the character’s redefinition of resilience. In popular culture, resilience is often portrayed through a triumphalist lens—the hero who rises stronger after every fall, unbowed and unbroken. Jane offers something different, something Syquia finds utterly truthful.
This vision of resilience—as persistence rather than triumph—speaks to a society increasingly aware of the toll that constant demands for strength take on the human psyche. In an era of burnout, of trauma-informed approaches to mental health, Jane’s quiet determination to survive and to define herself on her own terms takes on new significance, new relatable-ness.
Charlotte Brontë’s novel has, of course, been adapted countless times before. But this production arrives at a particular inflection point in American culture—a moment when questions of identity, autonomy, and the right to self-definition have moved from academic discourse into everyday conversation.
As our conversation draws to a close, I ask Syquia what she hopes audiences will take away from the production.
“Well, I hope they go on the journey,” she says, simply. “I hope they are interested to go on Jane’s journey with her.”
A Noise Within’s production of Jane Eyre runs through April 20, 2025, after the official opening on March 29. The show is staged at A Noise Within Theatre, located at 3352 E. Foothill Blvd., Pasadena, CA 91107. For more information, call (626) 356-3100 or visit www.anoisewithin.org for tickets and details
