Up From the Ashes
Please note: This article is published as an archive copy from Philadelphia City Paper. My City Paper is not affiliated with Philadelphia City Paper. Philadelphia City Paper was an alternative weekly newspaper in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The last edition was published on October 8, 2015.
Havertown playwright Kate McGrath explores the nation-changing 1911 fire at an NYC factory owned by the Triangle Shirtwaist Company in her new one-woman play.
Havertown playwright Kate McGrath explores the nation-changing 1911 fire at a New York City factory owned by the Triangle Shirtwaist Company in her new one-woman play starring Isa St. Clair, examining the American labor movement’s efforts before and after the tragedy from multiple points of view. Factory owners, protesters like Mother Jones and Rose Schneiderman and immigrant workers — 146 of whom perished in the fire, most of them young Jewish and Italian women — are all brought to life. Given the recent devastating fires under similar unsafe working conditions in Bangladesh garment factories, McGrath’s script, developed through a residency with Iron Age Theatre and the Philadelphia Dramatists Center, addresses the present as much as the past. Up from the Ashes runs this weekend in Iron Age’s Norristown home base and next weekend in Center City.
Jan. 9-12, $10-$20, The Centre Theater, 208 DeKalb St., Norristown, Pa., and Jan. 17-19, Off-Broad St. Theatre, 1636 Sansom St., 610-279-1013, iron-age-theatre.ticketleap.
