As the fall season approaches, Milford High School Theater Workshop puts on a new production of the historical drama based on a true story, Radium Girls. 

Radium Girls, the production written by D.W. Gregory, follows the true events of the female factory workers of the 1920s getting radium poisoning due to the glow-in-the-dark paint they used to paint watch dials and the court cases that followed. 

The radium paint was consumed by the girls licking the brushes to get a fine tip to paint numbers on the dials. Very few people knew that this was dangerous and later caused death for all of them (some side effects of the sickness for the girls were mainly a rotting jaw, broken teeth, brittle bones, dehydration, fatigue, etc…). 

According to the Science Museum Group Blog, at this time there were several cases of radium found in the dial painters’ bodies. The three factories that made radium watch dials were in Orange, New Jersey, Ottawa Illinois, and Waterbury Connecticut.

This particular play follows a previous factory worker, Grace Fryer, from Orange, New Jersey, portrayed in this production by junior, Giovanna Weiner, and her fight for justice as she suffers the side effects of radium poisoning in a time when women were given little credit for the work they contributed, and denied that it was the company’s fault for the deaths of these women. 

This is Milford High School Theater Workshop’s first time in a while doing a dramatic play, as opposed to a comedy. The cast is learning how to put on a serious production, and important history as they wrap up blocking the scenes and get closer to their Tech Week. 

“It’s been a learning experience,” says the productions director and Milford High School mathematics teacher, Kristina Lando. 

The other noted leadership roles in this production include Senior Gianna Pasacane as the producer, Junior William Brown as assistant producer, Danica Crim and Nora Pavento leading Crew as Stage Managers, and teachers Avery Travis and Tiffany Cote as the advisors for Crew. Opening night is on November 22 at 7pm. There are also performances on November 23 at 7pm, and a Sunday, November 24th matinee at 3pm.