Based on true events, Radium Girls follows teen sisters, Bessie and Jo Cavallo, who dream of Hollywood and Egyptian pyramids as they paint luminous watch dials at the American Radium factory in New Jersey. When Jo loses a tooth, Bessie’s world is turned upside down as a mystery slowly unravels. She discovers a corporate cover-up and, in a radical coming of age story, Bessie and the Radium Girls decide to take on American Radium. Based on historical events, the national sensation following the notorious case of the Radium Girls in 1928 ultimately led to significant and lasting impact in the area of workplace health and safety and the study of radioactivity.

Lydia Dean Pilcher

Lydia Dean Pilcher (Producer/Director) is a two-time Emmy winner and Academy Award nominee based in New York City. She is inspired by themes of cultural identity, female empowerment, and social justice, and has produced over 40 feature films including 12 films and the six-hour mini-series, A Suitable Boy, with director Mira Nair. Pilcher  is a long time environmental activist and believer in the power of stories to create change. She recently directed a WWII female spy thriller, A Call to Spy (IFC Films).

Ginny Mohler

Ginny Mohler (Writer/Director) is a filmmaker, writer, and visual artist. Prior to Radium Girls, she worked as a producer and researcher on non-fiction television programs. Mohler's background as an archival researcher laid the groundwork for her passion for untold stories about women who challenge structures of power. Mohler has been an Artist-in-Residence at the Virginia Center for Creative Arts, VCCA Moulin à Nef in France, and the Studios at Mass MOCA (2020). She has a BFA in Film & TV from NYU Tisch School of the Arts.

Emily McEvoy

Emily McEvoy (Producer) is a Michigan-born, New York-based producer. She produced the film MATERNA (Tribeca '20), starring Kate Lyn Sheil and Rory Culkin and directed by David Gutnik, which was awarded 2 prizes by the Tribeca Jury. Emily produced the short film Cheer Up Baby (Sundance '18) directed by Adinah Dancyger and starring Bobbi Menuez (I Love Dick, Euphoria) and is finishing the debut film by director Betsey Brown, "Actors", starring her brother Peter Vack (Mozart in the Jungle, Love Life). McEvoy is passionate about the tool of storytelling - its capacity to teach us about ourselves, to find unity points, and to reflect the never ending complexities of our collective human experience. 

Joey King as Bessie

Joey King has received critical acclaim for her starring role in the true crime drama series The Act (2019) and earned both Primetime Emmy Award and Golden Globe Award nominations for her performance. Joey King has appeared in Crazy, Stupid, Love (2011), The Dark Knight Rises (2012), Oz the Great and Powerful (2013), The Conjuring (2013), White House Down (2013), Independence Day: Resurgence (2016), Wish Upon (2017), The Kissing Booth (2018), and Slender Man (2018). 

Abby Quinn as Jo

Abby most recently played a lead role in the comedy Good Girls Get High and starred alongside Edie Falco, Jenny Slate, and John Turturro in Landline, a film by the same creative team behind the multi-award winning Obvious Child. In television, she recently appeared in Arkangel, an episode of Netflix's Black Mirror that was directed by Jodie Foster, and in an episode of AMC's Better Call Saul. She played Annie in Greta Gerwig's award-winning adaptation of Little Women.

Colby Minifie as Doris

Colby Minifie can most recently be seen in the hit superhero series for Amazon, The Boys, created by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg. She also stars in season five and six of Fear the Walking Dead, and is in Charlie Kaufman's highly anticipated film on NETFLIX, I'm Thinking of Ending Things. In 2018, Minfie starred as Ginger in the award-winning series, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel; and in 2015, she starred in the popular Netflix series, Jessica Jones. Minifie started acting when she was twelve years old and has notable stage credits including the Broadway revival of Six Degrees of Separation; the Roundabout Theatre Company's revival of A Long Day's Journey Into Night, alongside Jessica Lange; and the very successful Off-Broadway run of Punk Rock for MCC Theater. Other film and television credits include The Blacklist, Law & Order: SVU and Nurse Jackie.

A CINE MOSAIC PRODUCTION
in association with
DOUBLE PLAY CONNECTIONS, SCHAEFER SISTERS
PROBO PRODUCTIONS and CREATIVE INSTINCT

Directed by: Lydia Dean Pilcher & Ginny Mohler

Written by: Ginny Mohler & Brittany Shaw

Produced by: Lydia Dean Pilcher, Emily McEvoy

Executive Producers: Lily Tomlin, Harriet Newman Leve, Jane Wagner,

Jayne Baron Sherman, Willette Klausner

Associate Producers : Samudrika Arora, Stina Hamlin 

Casting:  Anne Davison & Cindy Tolan 
Production Designer: Emmeline E. Wilks-Dupoise
Editor: Giacomo Ambrosini;  Associate Editor: Tia Douglas
Cinematographer: Mathieu Plainfossé
Composer: Lillie Rebecca McDonough
Costume Designer: Sylvia Grieser
Music Supervisor: Linda Cohen

CAST

Joey King, Abby Quinn, Cara Seymour, Susan Heyward, Scott Shepherd, Neal Huff,
Collin Kelly-Sordelet, John Bedford Lloyd, Joe Grifasi, Colby Minifie, Olivia Macklin,
Greg Hildreth, Brandon Gill, Veanne Cox, Tom Galantich, Steven Hauck

 

 

“Radium Girls” has a surprising, disturbing parallel with what’s happening today in its court scenes where medical authorities testify that radium is lethal. Many workers and their family members scoff and are openly incredulous.

“At the time we were filming, I remember Joey and I talked a lot about that. It was unsettling to watch these videos in the ‘20s and you think, ‘It’s not that way anymore’ when you’re told what’s good for you when the men behind this knew the truth.

“Now it’s so timely. There’s so much false information and a president who won’t wear a mask. It’s ‘Who do you trust’ — which is the same thing back then.”

by Stephen Schaefer Boston Herald

Radium Girls proves engrossing, thanks to its powerful real-life tale and the excellent performances by leads King and Quinn, who make us fully care about their characters' fates.

You can feel the urgency fueling Lydia Dean Pilcher and Ginny Mohler's historical drama about a little-known, shameful episode in our country's past.

by Frank Scheck The Hollywood Reporter

A worthy entry in the category of workers’ rights movies, “Radium Girls,” like “Silkwood,” is based on actual events. In it, the directors Lydia Dean Pilcher and Ginny Mohler reveal a little-known part of history with a loudly beating feminist heart and a narrative grounded in reality.

by Kristen Yoonsoo Kim The New York Times

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