Women's war efforts recalled

Ilona Rodgers and Cathie Harrop in WWI-era ambulance. Photo/supplied

What do you think New Zealand women did in the war of 1914 to 1918? Did they knit, bake Anzac biscuits, or were nurses? It was a time when women's lives changed beyond recognition, in their homes and families.

Celebrated actresses Ilona Rodgers and Cathie Harrop have built an impressive performance around the topic. Their show They Also Serve can be seen at Tauranga Art Gallery on April 16. With the support of musicians Paul Harrop and Jennie Khan, Ilona and Cathie will bring to life, through words and music, the stories of Kiwi women at home and abroad during WWI .

Ilona and Cathie will entertain with integrity and humour, whilst bringing to the public through the medium of theatre, this part of our history when women 'rose to the occasion' and with true No 8 wire mentality they more than coped, only to be forgotten almost completely by the history book writers of our nation.

Many women were greatly affected by the loss of their men and the social turnaround in their lives over the four years of war and shortly afterwards. Should we also remember the despair of the women who just couldn't knit, who may have received up to four of the dreaded telegrams, or the misguided white feather girls?

"The audience will be encouraged to pass on their own family history of women at the end of the performance when there will be time to talk about their stories with the performers," says Tauranga Art Gallery's event co-ordinator Kalou Koefoed.

"Hopefully this may encourage people to go back to their own families to record and share this part of our history," she says.

They Also Serve celebrates the bravery and ingenuity of women who never left the country, of the heroic women who joined as nurses to serve with our forces all over Europe and also the many of our women who were already overseas following careers that were temporarily put aside and for some never resumed.

The programme will promote and celebrate cultural diversity by including stories and music of women of all ages and ethnicities and backgrounds. It aims to remind people of a time when the women of New Zealand changed from a position of outlying colonialism to take their part in the modern developing world.

For Cathie and Ilona, who have performed this show at the Auckland Museum, Te Aroha Little Theatre and The Little Theatre at Matamata, this is a tribute to the astonishing contribution the nation's women made when their menfolk were making their own contribution elsewhere.

the fine print
WHAT: They Also Serve ¦When: Saturday, April 16, at 5pm
Where: Tauranga Art Gallery, 108 Willow St
Cost: $45 general admission / $40 Friends/Students
Tickets: At Tauranga Art Gallery or call (0)7 578 7933