Set for an Oc­to­ber 20 pre­miere at the his­toric Lit­tle Carib The­atre, Wood­brook, Tony Hall's Lord­street The­atre, in as­so­ci­a­tion with Trevor Jadunath, presents one of the most an­tic­i­pat­ed lo­cal plays in re­cent mem­o­ry: Miss Miles – the Woman of the World.Writ­ten and di­rect­ed by vet­er­an ac­tor, play­wright and di­rec­tor Tony Hall, the one-woman play Miss Miles – The Woman of the World fea­tures the award-win­ning ac­tress Ce­cil­ia Salazar as Trinida­di­an ac­tivist, singer, fash­ion­ista and pub­lic ser­vant Gene Miles.The play fo­cus­es on the clash be­tween Gene Miles' con­science, re­li­gious faith, be­lief in truth and the rigid pre-set no­tions of the sta­tus quo.

The sto­ry traces the 42 years of this at­trac­tive and in­tel­li­gent woman's short life – from grow­ing up in pre-in­de­pen­dence, colo­nial, Ro­man Catholic Trinidad, at­tend­ing St Joseph's Con­vent (Port-of-Spain), to the black pow­er days of the ear­ly 1970's, when a strug­gle to de­vel­op a new and just so­ci­ety gave rise to so­cial trans­for­ma­tion.Gene Miles, a T&T pa­tri­ot, took on the pow­er­ful state ad­min­is­tra­tion in an an­ti-cor­rup­tion cam­paign, The Gas Sta­tion Rack­et in the 1960s – and paid the ul­ti­mate price.It is per­ceived wide­ly that she stood up for high stan­dards of moral­i­ty in the pub­lic ser­vice. She caused a com­mis­sion of in­quiry to be launched in­to what be­came known as the Gas Sta­tion rack­et.

But along the way "Gas Sta­tion Gene," who was ru­moured as hav­ing an af­fair with the Peo­ple's Na­tion­al Move­ment min­is­ter of gov­ern­ment John O'Hal­lo­ran, lost her job, be­came a ner­vous wreck and was of­ten seen wan­der­ing the city of Port-of-Spain, bedrag­gled and drunk. She died of a heart at­tack at 42.Hall has a long ca­reer of doc­u­ment­ing lo­cal lives and cul­ture. He has worked with the Trinidad The­atre Work­shop and at the pi­o­neer­ing Banyan Ltd. In 1992 he co-di­rect­ed the award-win­ning doc­u­men­tary, And the Dish Ran Away With the Spoon.His ac­claimed play, Jean and Di­nah, is be­ing adapt­ed in­to a fea­ture film. Hall's oth­er plays in­clude the pow­er­ful and provoca­tive Twi­light Caf&ea­cute;; and with David Rud­der, the ground break­ing ca­lyp­so mu­si­cal The Brand New Lucky Di­a­mond Horse­shoe Club.Hall's work has been cel­e­brat­ed by lo­cal au­di­ence, crit­ics and fel­low writ­ers as some of "the finest West In­di­an the­atre" (Derek Wal­cott), a "tri­umph" (Earl Lovelace), and "live­ly...touch­ing...pow­er­ful" (Judy Ray­mond).

Ce­cil­ia Salazar is one of this coun­try's most cel­e­brat­ed and well-known ac­tress­es. She holds a BA in The­atre from Brock Uni­ver­si­ty in On­tario, Cana­da. She al­so holds the cur­rent record for the most awards for act­ing giv­en to an in­di­vid­ual in T&T, sev­en Cacique Awards. Some of her many roles in­clude: Dame Jab in 3Canal's Jab in the Box; Sarah/Woman in Hall's Twi­light Caf&ea­cute;; Cleotil­da in Earl Lovelace's Drag­on Can't Dance; Lizzie in Richard Ra­goo­bars­ingh's Mary Could Dance; Bolom in Derek Wal­cott's Ti-Jean and His Broth­ers; and Mme de Tourvel in Christo­pher Hamp­ton's Les Lia­sons Dan­gereuse.Part­ner­ing with the Lord­street for Miss Miles are pro­duc­er Trevor Jadunath; Mau­ri "KeKere" Hall, who has writ­ten the mu­sic fea­tured in the show; and an award-win­ning pro­duc­tion crew, in­clud­ing pro­duc­er Trevor Jadunath; Celia Wells; Sean Leonard;Christo­pher Co­zi­er; Wen­dell Man­war­ren; Leslynne Matthews; Car­o­line Tay­lor; and Ar­lene Babb.

More In­fo

Miss Miles – The Woman of the World runs over two week­ends: Oc­to­ber 20 –23, and Oc­to­ber 26–30. All shows are at 6.30 pm.For more in­fo about the pro­duc­tion, ad­di­tion­al tick­et­ing out­lets, be­hind the scenes pho­tos, vis­it Lord­street The­atre's Face­book page athttp://www.face­book.com/lord­streetthe­atre, call 681-7475, e-mail: lord­street@ya­hoo.com or vis­it the Web site http://www.lord­street.net