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St. Cloud State University
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Women of war get new voice
By Diana Matusewic
Published:
Thursday, March 20, 2003
Media Credit: Jason Risberg
SCSU�s Women�s Center presented �A Piece of my Heart,� a play about six women who volunteered in the Vietnam War, Wednesday night in Ritsche Auditorium. The play was produced and performed by Playing On Purpose Productions.
In honor of women who have suffered in war, and as part of Women's History Month, the Women's Center brought to campus a play to shed some light on the role women have in war, to give them the same recognition that soldiers get.
For Wednesday night at the Ritsche Auditorium "A Piece of My Heart," written by playwright Shirley Lauro was performed by six women and one man playing the roles of various soldiers.
The play is about the experiences of six women in the Vietnam War. It showed the physical, as well as the mental events that went on during and after the war. The women's history month committee wanted to expose women's involvement in the war.
"We all thought it (the play) would be a great way to honor women veterans," said Tamara Hennes-Vix, graduate assistant for the Women's Center.
It's a one-act play without props or change of scenery. It relies mostly on the imagination as each woman tells her story.
The opening setting is at the Wall in Washington D.C. before each character volunteers for the war. Each woman gives her reasons for wanting to join.
"It's very fast paced, it's fragmented, it's set with very few props so the actors are challenged," said Kathy Ray, playwright manager and one of the performers in the production. "You meet the characters before they were in Vietnam, then while they were in Vietnam and after Vietnam."
Once the women enter the war in 1968 they're rushed like soldiers. Their lives change within minutes as they're forced to endure intense trauma while building a psychological block in their mind. Sometimes even the wards were shot at and the soldiers on the beds died, but regardless, the nurses had to push everything to the back of their mind and keep working.
The play also shows the damage after the war - the flashbacks, the inability to hold jobs and the feelings of an outcast.
"It made me so much more aware of some of the circumstances that women experienced during the Vietnam War; very thought provoking," said Julie Peters, faculty adjunct of communication studies, "each one of them as individuals had their own stories. The stories were as diverse as the individuals. I couldn't help but think what's going to happen tomorrow because there'll be more stories."
Dennis Lietha, a Vietnam veteran from St. Cloud, said he cried when the women sang "Proud Mary" by Janis Joplin because he drove a tank with that same name.
Jolie Simmon was a Vietnam nurse in San Antonio, Texas in 1974-1979. Now she's on the Women Veterans Chair for Vietnam Veterans of America.
"It's almost like a dream sometimes - all your senses bombarded at once," she said.
Playing on Purpose Productions, located in Barrett, is dedicated to addressing social issues through plays. Some other plays they put on include "Coya Comes Back," about the first woman in Congress for Minnesota (will be in St. Paul after touring "A Piece of My Heart") and "Play The Game," a play about sexual assault issues.
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