The original Roaring Girl, Mary Frith – aka 'Moll Cutpurse' – was a foul-mouthed, hard-drinking, pipe-smoking, cross-dressing thief and street entertainer who both appalled and enthralled Jacobean London. The antithesis of what a ‘good woman’ ought to be, she picked pockets, she caroused in taverns, and in 1611, when women were still banned from performing in public theatres, she swaggered on stage in full male dress to perform in a new play inspired by her own madcap life – entitled The Roaring Girl.