These Shining Lives
Written by Melanie Marnich
Directed by Kami Zbanek Hill
March 6-8 and 13-14, 2020
First Street Community Center
Narrated by one of the workers, Catherine Donohue, These Shining Lives shows women getting a chance for a well-paying job in the 1920s and early 1930s, which was uncharacteristic for the time in the United States. The job, which seems easy enough to the four main characters, is painting the hour markings onto different sized watch dials using a radium compound which glows in the dark. Radium Dial, the company that hires the women to do the painting, tells them that there is no evidence that radium is harmful, and even that it has health benefits. After a period of time, the workers notice that their hands start glowing in the dark… (source)
