"World in women's hands" opens at Ashby
Stage
Peggy Reskin
September 21, 8:39 AM
Examiner.com
This World in a Woman's Hands is being
performed at the Ashby Stage with the excellence
the Shotgun Players have established in all their
previous works. Marcus Gardley and Molly Holm
collaborated in the well received "Love is
a Dream House in Loren" with outstanding
critical acclaim and sold out house being a former
major success. They bring again focusing a brilliant
light to a worthy subject. We are shown the effect
of WWII and the Kaiser Shipyards in Richmond1942
where a 24 hour factory producing the Liberty
Ships needed for battle through 1945. 10 million
soldiers were away at war, and so it was the women
who came to work, symbolized as Rosie the Riveter
at the time. The women came from all across the
country, and faced whatever inequities with little
other than the relationship they shared with each
other. The stage design and setting is nothing
short of an inspiration as the characters fill
the space and the stories come through where "the
composition of the music follows the text and
movement of the play. A product of Marcus Gardley,
Molly Holm and Marcus Shelby;Marcus Shelby offers
a string bass background for the excellence of
the actors singing tells their stories best. The
first act gives grounding to the experience of
those times, referencing the issues at play and
their effect on the life of these women.
In the second
act, it is all brought home to what we can come
to know about Richmond today, and the tragedy
of youth shooting each other today as lived by
these same Rosie women present time.
The Richmond Iron Triangle abandoned after the
World War II because the production of ships for
battle was no longer required leaving behind people
stranded and far from any means to take hold of
new life. The women who brought about recognition
for the first efforts of civil rights, worker's
rights and unions were let go pretty much the
day the war ended, many of the rights they earned
being let go with them. The men returning from
the war would take their jobs but the area would
never recover economically. This is social history
perhaps we've come across but it is the performance
of this cast and the stage production that supports
them that makes this an experience more felt than
known, significant in it's present time content.
Margo Hall as Gloria takes to the ground a depth
of understanding, as does the outstanding Dena
Martinez as Maria as pivotal dynamics between
them give view to a more complex view of our history,
as well as theirs.
Theatre that has come to grips with hard won new
information and understanding is a blessing; leaving
the theatre resolving to be a better person as
a result of being a witness to that understanding
is always a contribution and This World in
a Woman's Hands provides that experience.