These Shining Lives at The Park Theatre – review

Catherine Donohue (Charity Wakefield) and Tom (Alec Newman) in a scene from These Shining Lives. Photograph: The Park Theatre

It is the roaring 1920s in Chicago, and with the First World War having recently ended, the role of women in society is undergoing change.

During the conflict it was necessary for women to join the workforce, and it just so happens they liked the freedoms their newfound economic independence afforded them.

Equality is still a long way off however, and while the idea of women working is apparently tolerated, phrases like “That’s what you get for having a wife that works” are thrown around with alarming frequency.

Welcome to the world portrayed in Melanie Marnich’s drama These Shining Lights, the inaugural show at the new Park Theatre in Finsbury Park.

Loveday Ingram directs the majority female cast in this production, which highlights the courage and tenacity of the characters.

Charity Wakefield turns in a brilliant performance as Catherine Donohue who we are first introduced to as a loving devoted mother and housewife and not much else.

Catherine’s musings at the beginning of the play focus on her relationship with her husband Tom (Alec Newman).

While she’s is happy being a wife and mother she is clearly not fulfilled and expresses a desire to work and know what it feels like to be able to pave her own way.

When she finds employment painting watch faces for the Radium Dial company she thinks all her dreams have finally come true. However, everything is not as it seems.

Unbeknownst to their employees the radium powder Radium Dial are providing to paint the watch faces with is in fact poisoning their workers.

It is in the friendships that Catherine develops with her co-workers, a team of three other women – Charlotte (Honeysuckle Weeks), Frances (Melanie Bond), Pearl (Nathalie Carrington) – that the heart of the play shines through.

There is a genuine chemistry between between the female cast members that helps emphasise the real depth of the friendships the characters develop.

It is a breath of fresh air to see a realistic representation of female friendships as opposed to the 2-D, shallow relationships so often seen in modern productions.

The women do talk about shopping and their menfolk, but when things start to go downhill, the strength of their relationships shows that there’s a heck of a lot more to them than that.

These Shining Lives
Park Theatre
Clifton Terrace
N4 3JP
Until 9 June 2013