Court-Martial at Fort Devens. Photo by Liz Lauren____________
Playwright: Jeffrey Sweet
At: Victory Gardens Biograph, 2433 N. Lincoln
Phone: 773-871-3000; $35-$45
Runs through: March 11
BY MARY SHEN BARNIDGE
You'll still hear it chanted in army Basic Training camps nationwide—'Trainee, trainee, don't be blue/my recruiter fooled me, too'—but a rueful taunt giving voice to personal grievance is one thing, and institutionalized bigotry, quite another. Civilians might permit legal injustices based in regional customs, but the rules governing the United States Armed Forces are designated the Uniform Code of Military Justice—a title prohibiting any partisanship in its enforcement. A chapter in the story of this policy's gestation provides the foundation for the docudrama currently occupying the Victory Gardens Biograph.
World War II granted full status to soldiers of color—albeit, retaining units segregated from those comprised of white recruits, total integration not becoming a reality until 1962. The Women's Army Corps was, from its inception, to be an integrated branch of service, however. So it was of considerable significance that at Fort Devens, Mass., in 1945, a squad of African-American women whose enlistment contracts promised that they would be trained as medical technicians found themselves performing janitorial duties on orders from the post's commander ( not the expected redneck, steeped in southern prejudice, but a New Englander—from Maine, yet! ) . When the indignant WACs staged a strike, they were accused of mutiny and brought up for court-martial.
Courtroom dramas such as A Few Good Men and the television series JAG have acquainted mainstream audiences with a superficial view of military trials, but it is to playwright Jeffrey Sweet's credit that he resists the temptation to propagandize, adhering instead to his facts—even regarding dialogue lifted verbatim from court transcripts. Our villain may be a weasel in dress greens, but he is no monster—nor are our heroines any more saintly than our biases render them. To be sure, Phillip Edward Van Lear makes defense attorney Julian Rainey something of a water-walker, but the show belongs to Velma Austin, who lends to the role of career-officer Lieutenant Tenola Stoney a dignity and bearing riveting our attention her every onstage moment.
'The army is a machine' declares a savvy administrator, and while its wheels may turn more slowly than in this tidy 90-minute account, the possibility of our leaders being embarrassed into heeding matters surrounding issues of morale sound a hopeful note amid the despair of our own troubled times.