Review: ‘Rosie’ Story Gets Beautiful Treatment in ‘Rivets’
By Pat Craig, Contra Costa Times, Walnut Creek, Calif.
Feb. 29–”Rivets,” a challenging and ambitious musical saga of women war workers and life on the World War II home front, premiered in a workshop production Thursday at San Pablo’s Contra Costa College.
Written by Kathryn G. McCarty, with music by Mitchell Covington the play is set in various locations around the Bay Area, but primarily the Kaiser shipyards in the Richmond area that turned out liberty ships at a breakneck pace throughout the early ’40s.
It’s the story of Rosie the Riveter — women who were employed in the shipyards, doing “men’s work” because the men were at war. It’s a tumultuous tale of the enormous social changes and a mass migration to the Bay Area from throughout the country for the lucrative war jobs.
And, although the Rosies were ultimately successful, the transition was tough, with racial attitudes imported by the new arrivals to the East Bay, sexual stereotypes held fast by some of the men and women venturing into uncharted territory, and an enormous uncertainty of not only how the war will change the world, but how America will be radically altered by the new roles for people.
McCarty tells a sweeping story, beautifully staged by Clay David, who has managed the near-impossible task of making a cast of 50 not only look interesting on the stage, but drive the story as they moved across the representational shipyard set.
This weekend’s performances are billed as workshops, and, indeed, this is the first time the play has been performed for an
audience, and the cast, of students and people from the general public, rose to the occasion with a well wrought and nicely paced production.
In the future (and there will be several other stagings of the show, leading to a production aboard the Liberty Shop, Live Oak Victory in Richmond in October), McCarty may want to focus the show on fewer subplots, which would sharpen the impact of the piece and ultimately tell a more satisfying story by allowing some of the characters to emerge from the musical more fully developed.
Perhaps the strongest feature of “Rivets” is the decision to leave the story in its time, with no bow to contemporary sensibilities. While this may be harsh in places, it also presents an accurate picture of attitudes of the time, and makes the fact all these wildly different people were able to come together and produce ships at record speed. It also makes the patriotism and single-minded attention to the war effort all the more poignant.
Reach Pat Craig at 925-945-4736 or pcraig@bayareanewsgroup.com
“Rivets,” by Kathryn G. McCarty and Mitchell Covington
Jean and John Knox Performing Arts Center, Contra Costa College, San Pablo
8 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 3 p.m. Sunday
2 hours
$15
510-235-7800 X4274
—–
To see more of the Contra Costa Times, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.contracostatimes.com/.
Copyright (c) 2008, Contra Costa Times, Walnut Creek, Calif.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.