Packing in the drama
Young Chang
The workers at this Gloucester, Mass. fish-packing plant are full of
pathos and eros and everything in between.
They’re hard-working people who know how to show up to survive and
deal with the sexual and other tensions that burden their every day.
One woman yearns to be more educated and to take a trip to Connecticut
because she’s never been that far. Others don’t know what a dolphin is.
The main character, Flo Rizzo, laments that she has nothing to teach
her children other than the ability to pack fish.
The workers also struggle with the stress of pending unemployment, as
the processing plants of their time -- the mid-’80s -- start closing
down.
“They’re based on real characters that Israel Horovitz grew to love in
Gloucester, Mass.,” said Maria Hall-Brown, who plays Flo for Orange Coast
College’s production of Horovitz’ “North Shore Fish.” “These people live
on the edge and their emotions are immediately on the surface.”
Despite a cast of six women and two men, Hall-Brown says the story
isn’t about women, but about identifying yourself and resolving the
question: if a life of work ends, does the life end as well?
The Pulitzer Prize-nominated play, directed by OCC theatre professor
John Ferzacca, is about a group of workers who follow generations of
ancestors who worked the same job. They are underpaid and unskilled, the
moms are also trying to raise children, and none of them really know how
life will be when their plant closes.
Hall-Brown, a producer for KOCE who enrolled in an OCC class to act in
the show, said portraying her character Flo is like getting to play her
alter ego.
“It’s exhausting and at the same time it’s very liberating,” she said.
“I’m playing against type. She’s a working-class girl who curses like a
sailor. She’s raw and volatile.”
One of the two men in the play is Sal, a womanizer who lords his
sexuality over the females and contributes to the tension in the
workplace.
“The daily lives of these women is very harsh,” said Greg McClure, a
student at OCC who plays Sal. “But the ironic part is I don’t think any
one of them would describe themselves as a hopeless person.”
The story is one that McClure says will ring true for audiences today,
whether or not they have experience in blue-collar work.
“There are so many plays about women in the workplace, but this deals
with women having to come to work and deal with the men there, deal with
the children and everything else,” he said.
FYI
* What: “North Shore Fish”
* When: Today, Sunday, March 14-17. Show times are 8 p.m. Thursdays
through Saturdays and 2 p.m. Sundays
* Where: Orange Coast College’s Drama Lab Theatre, 2701 Fairview Road, Costa Mesa
* Cost: $7-$10
* Call: (714) 432-5880
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