By Lucy Komisar
This play is about body image and politics. I’ll take the politics first.
A group of Latinas at a dress-making workshop in Los Angeles succeed in a challenge to produce a big turnaround of dresses that a buyer wants because another producer suddenly failed. I like that. I want women to get ahead. And I like Estela (Florencia Cuenca), the feisty factory manager.
But the second part of the story is that some of the workers are fat and even obese. And this is presented as okay. It is not okay. Forget about how very fat people are gross. I don’t want people to get their legs amputated and even die of Type 2 Diabetes. Why would anybody promote this?
Estela, a tough assertive undocumented alien, runs a dress factory in Los Angeles. Most of the workers in the factory swam the Rio Grande. They sing about sacrifice.
Estela’s sister Ana (Tatianna Córdoba), who was born in the U.S., wants to be writer, has an internship at a local paper and has gotten a scholarship to Columbia. She wants to go to the journalism school. (OK, so far the story is fine but unexceptional.) She, her sister and mother are fat.
The factory suddenly gets an order from a Mrs. Wright (Monica Tulia Ramirez) for 200 dresses in three weeks. Estela takes it though it will mean doubling down work by everyone. But other events are happening.
It’s the time of Reagan. We see a Migra (immigration police) assault, old film but today’s story. Itzel (Aline Mayagoittia) a Guatemalan girl, tells how soldiers in her country had burned her house down. (Not mentioned, the U.S. government supported the Guatemalan military that slaughtered over 200,000 indigenous people.) She is afraid of disappearing. Her song, “If I were a bird,“ is a charmer.
Ana talks to a congressional candidate, who can’t comment. Of course not, they are corrupt, part of the system that allows the murders.
Carmen (Justina Machado), tells her daughter Ana she needs to lose 10, 15 pounds. But her date Henry brings tres leches for the group. It is a delicious but very caloric pudding. Henry and Ana are both fat. Carmen with a piercing alto voice, tells Ana, “You could stand to skip a meal.” Yes!
Ana is doing story about contractors who have undocumented workers and don’t pay them. She asks Mrs. Wright, “Can you comment on these shady practices?”
This is moving in a good direction. But then the story shifts to the factory workers and somehow ends up with “real women have curves.” Meaning it’s fine to be fat, even obese. (By the way, thin women also have curves, unless you think curves mean flab. Are curvy beauty pageant winners fat?)
And to make the point, the workers strip to their underwear. This has to be one of the most unappetizing moments I have seen in theater. Ugh! Most have bras, though a lesbian wears a t-shirt since according to the writers, lesbians don’t acknowledge having breasts. (I thought that was transmen.) Some have spare tires (midriff flab). The really obese woman has a cover-up that could hide a small car. The one who looks best is Prima Flaca. Flaca is Spanish for thin. So they are aware of weight.
I liked the part where the women succeed in delivering the goods to the nasty company operative. Not brilliant, but okay.
I didn’t like the part where people are told it is fine to be fat and even obese in spite of never mentioned medical results, including diabetes and death. Since when is it progressive or feminist to promote killing off women — and men? 45% of Americans are obese. (38% in Mexico. And in France, the land of great cuisine, and fashion, only 12%.) In the U.S. this is a life-threatening epidemic. People don’t need to hear that it’s fine to be fat.
“Real Women Have Curves.” Book by Lisa Loomer with Nell Benjamin, directed and choreographed by Sergio Trujillo, music & lyrics by Joy Huerta and Benjamin Velez. James Earl Jones Theatre, 138 West 48th St, NYC. Runtime 2hrs10min. Opened April 27, 2025. Open run.