“Radium Girls” lights up the stage
By Anna Sturla,
BlueDevilHUB.com Editor-in-Chief–
A.C.M.E.’s newest play, “Radium Girls,” is a thrilling mixture of historical drama, excellent acting, and true-story details.
The play, set in the 1920s, centers on the young women employed by the U.S. Radium Corporation to paint wristwatch dials with a newly-discovered element: radium. The factory workers suddenly fall ill with a range of odd symptoms: back pain, anemia and bleeding jaws. As more workers sicken and die, the company attempts to buy their silence and hide new studies that link radium to radiation poisoning. The surviving “radium girls,” a phrase coined by the sensationalist reporters of the time, fight to hang on in a tense yet drawn-out lawsuit, hoping that their final efforts will help prevent more workers from being sacrificed by their employers in the name of the Almighty Dollar.
“Radium Girls” is blessed with not just a few star performers, but an entire ensemble cast of gifted actors. Eden Tomich and Antonio De Loera-Brust gave just some of the standout performances, with Tomich starring as Kathryn, the determined factory girl who starts the lawsuit, and De Loera-Brust with two supporting roles: sadistic corporate lawyer Markley and remorseful radium scientist Von Sochoky.
Davisites are blessed with world-class arts and entertainment, but everyone should take notice of “Radium Girls.”
Final performances take place Jan. 12 at 8 p.m. and Jan. 13 at 2 p.m., at the Pamela Trokanski Dance Studio, located at 2720 Del Rio Place in North Davis.
