The Green Room Theatre will present 'These Shining Lives' by Melanie Marnich, is a powerful play based on the true story of four women who worked for the Radium Dial Company in the US during the late 1920's and their friendship, strength, and determination to see justice done.
In the early years of the last century, radium was all the rage. There was radium face cream, radium cough medicine for children, even radium furniture polish. One of the most popular uses for radium was as an ingredient in the paint used to draw the numbers on luminous clock and watch faces, to make them glow in the dark. The painting of these numbers was mostly done by women. To make the digits even finer, and to speed up the painting process, they licked the end of their paintbrushes, little realising the effect that the radium would have on their bodies.
Catherine Donohue is thrilled to get a well-paid job at the new clock factory, and her adoring husband Tom is fascinated by the way that his wife seems to glow when she comes home after a shift. When Catherine and her work mates Charlotte Purcell, Francis O'Connell and Pearl Payne fall ill and are diagnosed with radium poisoning, they file a lawsuit against the company, who will not accept that radium is in any way dangerous. A leading attorney accepts the case but they have a fight on their hands and the result is in the balance.
Director Celia Bonner comments: "This wonderfully warm play highlights the growing friendship of a group of women and their strength when faced with a dreadful health diagnosis. It shows the shocking lack of seriousness or concern that many companies had for the health and wellbeing of their workers during the early to mid-part of 1900's. It is cases like this one that have led to the Health & Safety laws that we take for granted today, that should make the workplace safe for our generation.
"We have an excellent cast to tell this very powerful story including Meg Brassington, Madeleine Healey, Jess Trimble and Andy Neve and we are delighted to welcome back to The Green Room stage John Keen (last seen as George in 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?', 2019) and Alexandra Johnson (last seen as Lady Macbeth in 'Macbeth', 2011)."
Photo: from left to right: - Alexandra Johnson (as Catherine Donohue) and Meg Brassington (as Charlotte Purcell).
Each performance start times: evenings 7:45pm, matinee 2.30pm.
Tickets cost £10 for members, £12 full price and are now on sale from the theatre's website or the ticketline 01625 540933.
