The play "Real Women Have Curves" is about five Latinas working in a Los Angeles sweatshop, which blends into an overarching theme of family bonds and women's strength.
"They make dresses where they get paid for a dress at $13 apiece, and they're sold for $200," director Salomé Martinez-Lutz said. "They're the size of dresses these women could never in their dreams get into. They're small sizes.. And they talk about their dreams and hopes and earning a decent wage, and they talk about the men in their lives. They also share the story of being, at one time, undocumented aliens - and not from Mars. They're all from Mexico."
Santa Fe native Martinez-Lutz formed Teatro Nuevo México in 2003 after a five-year theater career with New York City's Repertorio Español, which she called the premier Latino theater company in the nation.
"It was in New York that I discovered Latino theater," she said. "So I knew when I came home to New Mexico (that) that's what I wanted to do, and I've been doing it."
"Real Women Have Curves" opens today at the National Hispanic Cultural Center at 1701 Fourth St. S.W.
Actress and hair stylist Florangeli Yerxa plays Carmen, the mother of 12 children. She
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characterizes the typical Mexican mother, she said, with the multitasking strength and emotional durability to do everything for her family. Her daughters Ana and Estella are main characters.
"She's witty and funny - always trying to make the situation better with her humor,"
Yerxa said about her character. "And I look like a freak. They have me in the craziest outfits you could see - flowered skirts and mismatched shirts and a bandana for my head and glasses. And sometimes, I wear two sets of glasses: my regular glasses and my reading glasses."
Yerxa won Actress of the Year in 2005 through the NHCC for her work in "Shadow of the Man," also directed by Martinez-Lutz. Yerxa called Martinez-Lutz a powerful role model for young actresses in Albuquerque.
"She is determined to always bring out the best in her actors," Yerxa said. "Regardless of the size of the role, you'll do the best job you've ever done in your entire life. We all respect her so highly. She's super cool."
It features an all-woman cast, save for the voice-over of a male DJ.
"We talk about family and how we got to this country, and the sadness and despair of not being a mother for one of the characters," Yerxa said. "And my daughter, who doesn't want anything but to change the world with her writing. And my other daughter, who wants to have her own business, the sewing factory. And my other daughter, Rosalie, thinks women should be sexy and thin, and by the end of (the play), she loves herself. She loves her curvaceous body."
'Real Women Have Curves'
Thursday, 7 p.m.
Friday-Saturday, 8 p.m.
Sunday, 2 p.m.
National Hispanic Cultural Center
1701 Fourth St. S.W.
$15-$25
Call the box office at (50) 247-9480 for more info.
