Fair warning: Thomas Middleton’s The Changeling can be difficult to read or watch. Most of the characters are a blend of the attractive and the disagreeable; they’re not individuals you’d want to meet or have a relationship with. The plot involves manipulation, sexual assault, scheming, and murder, and there’s a subplot that includes the use of the mentally ill as entertainment or comic relief. (Evidence suggests this unsavory practice was common in the early modern period.) As if that’s not enough, it’s misogynistic, like most early modern plays. To counter that aspect with a feminist discussion, I highly recommend the Changeling episode of “Not Another Shakespeare Podcast!.”

If The Changeling is stuffed with difficult subject matter and the characters are so awful, why is it so popular? Why does anyone bother? These are good questions, and the short response to both is that the play is extremely…