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What our audience says about the show...
"This show was surprisingly magnificent. I knew very little about it going in and I must say that it carried a pleasant punch."
The show was mesmerizing! I literally sat on the edge of my seat.
Unbelievably and uniquely wonderful! Thank you, and congratulations!
FROM ART TO HEART TO ACTION
Women of Resistance is a stage performance, inspired by the lives of the brave women who helped defeat the Nazis during WWII. We celebrate their lives through music, dance, storytelling and visual art.
Based in Sarasota, we plan to grow WOR into WOW with your help and take our shows nationally and internationally! Thank you to all our guests and donors.
Support Women of Resistance
To join our journey donate securely online. For information about sponsorship, please contact Vicki Chelf 941-928-3426 or John Lambie 941-323-8800
THE INSPIRATION
Women of Resistance
Women of Resistance (WOR) tells the amazing, little known, stories of seven heroic women who helped the Allies defeat Fascism during WWII. Their roles were diverse, ranging from radio operators and spies, to guerilla fighters and more. Some were leaders in the entertainment industry, and others hairdressers. They came from diverse cultures and backgrounds, but they all saw the horror of Nazism and vowed to do everything in their power to stop it. These are stories that inspire and empower. They are told through music, words, dance and images in short vignettes linked together and ended with a celebratory finale.
WOR began as a series of portraits, inspired by a visit to a museum of the Resistance in a small French village. There, artist, writer and co-producer Vicki Chelf learned about the role of women in WWII and was overcome with a desire to pay homage to these brave women. The paintings became a one-person gallery show. Viewers were intrigued by the paintings but wanted to know the stories behind the images. The idea of a stage production with music, storytelling and dance came to Vicki in a meditation and she called her friend Warren Slim Williams to see if he was interested in creating the music. Slim said he was on board and we haven’t looked back. This was in 2021. Since then, we have created a non-profit, brought on eight accomplished choreographers, workshopped our ideas and built the show from scratch, starting with performances in the art gallery.
THE WOMEN OF RESISTANCE
Nancy Wake
The Germans called her the White Mouse because she was so elusive. Nancy Wake became a free-lance journalist, moved to France, married a French Industrialist and became a socialite. Early on, after witnessing the Nazis in action in Austria, she understood the dangers, and did her best to alert the public. In wartime she escorted hundreds of Allied soldiers and downed airmen through occupied France into Spain. She also helped establish communication lines. She lived to the age of 98 and claimed to have once killed a Nazi with her bare hands.
Josephine Baker
The American expat was living in Paris when WWII broke out. She was the hottest performer in Europe. Everyone wanted to be near her, and no one suspected that the ebony beauty was anything other than a talented performer. She used her fame to be privy to conversations that were likely assumed to be over her head. Keeping her eyes and ears open, she took notes and became a valuable spy for the Resistance. She was also a Red Cross volunteer. After the war, she adopted 12 orphans of different races and religions in a quest to prove that all cultures can live together happily and peacefully.
Andree Peel
A hairdresser living in the port city of Brest in Brittany, Andree worked relentlessly to alert France to the danger posed by the Third Reich by distributing underground newspapers and aiding allied troops. Later, she led a team using flashlights to guide airmen to secret landing strips. She aided over 20,000 people and saved the lives of over 100 servicemen. She was arrested and sent to concentration camps. She nearly died of meningitis, was scheduled for the gas chambers twice and finally lined up before a firing squad to be shot. She was rescued at the last minute by American soldiers. She was deeply religious and after the war she became a healer. She lived to be 105.
Hedy Lamarr
This Austrian born actor was discovered by Louis B. Mayer and given a contract in Hollywood. She became a star and performed in several films, including Cecil B. De Mille’s, Samson and Delilah. She is lesser known as an inventor.
To help in the war effort she and composer George Antheil developed a radio guidance system for Allied torpedoes that used spread spectrum and frequency hopping technology. Unfortunately, the US Navy did not adopt the technology until the 1960’s. Nonetheless, she went on to raise $25 million in war bonds in 10 days by selling kisses.
Noor Inayat Khan
An Indian princess, Noor Inayat Khan’s father, Inayat Khan brought the wisdom of Sufism to the West starting in 1910. She was a dedicated Sufi, and a musician from a family of classical musicians. Noor was also a poet and an author of children’s books. She was a pacifist and lived her truth. She became the first wireless operator sent from London to France. It was one of the most dangerous jobs of the Resistance and radio operators usually lasted only about 6 weeks before they were captured and killed. After 6 months and a capture and escape, Noor was betrayed, for money, by her landlady and was sent to the Dachau concentration camp where she was executed at age 30. She never gave up any information to her torturers.
Lee Miller
Discontent with a highly successful career as a fashion model, Lee Miller left New York for Paris, to become a student of the famous Surrealist photographer Man Ray. Her social circle included Picasso, Jean Cocteau, Max Ernst, Paul Eluard and others. She could have easily sat out the war with her avant-garde friends, but instead she became a war correspondent and photographer. Her gritty photos of war, and the concentration camps are some of the most powerful visual documents of the horrors of her day. Perhaps the most famous of her war photographs is her self-portrait in Hitler’s bathtub taken just a couple of hours after his suicide.
Virginia Hall
Hailing from Baltimore, educated and brought up to become a proper lady, Virginia seems to have been, to her mother’s dismay, a born adventurer. In 1933 while hunting in Smyrna (now Turkey) she tripped on a barbed wire fence and shot herself in the leg, which had to be amputated at the knee. She studied several languages, and possessed an uncanny intuition to know who could be trusted. As the first woman SOE officer into Vichy, France she created a network that organized resistance movements, supplied agents with money, weapons and supplies and helped downed airmen escape. Later, she worked for the OSS as a radio operator, and more. At one point she escaped the Gestapo by trekking over a 7,500 ft pass in the Pyrenees, covering 50 miles in the snow in two days.
THE WOMEN OF THE WORLD
Inspire & Empower
Please support Women of the World project. You can help us showcase inspiring stories and empower women today through visual and performance art.
Special Thanks
The Gardener Foundation
Brenda Boone | Ann & Fred Bohlander
Christopher Downie | Albert Ford | Elizabeth Moore
The Mellon Foundation
We are grateful to our 2026 Giving Challenge donors, the Community Foundation of Sarasota County, with giving strengthened by The Patterson Foundation.
941-928-3426 | Contact Us
WOMEN OF RESISTANCE IS A 501(C)(3) CHARITABLE ORGANIZATION. FINANCIAL INFORMATION MAY BE OBTAINED FROM THE DIVISION OF CONSUMER SERVICES BY CALLING 1-800-435-7352 WITHIN THE STATE. REGISTRATION DOES NOT IMPLY ENDORSEMENT, APPROVAL, OR RECOMMENDATION BY THE STATE.