"Pick up your bail bonds on the way," she said. "You never know when you're going to need them."

That fighting spirit, coupled with a buoyant sense of humor, helped propel Costanza, now 70, into the history books. A first-generation Italian-American who never attended college, she was the first woman ever to be named "assistant to the president." Her mandate, as part of Jimmy Carter's inner circle, was to serve as a "window to the nation," and she gave people from all walks of life unprecedented access to the White House.

"I really believed that even if people disagreed with us, it was their White House, too," Costanza recalled. "I used to pull kids out of line for the White House tours and take them into the Oval Office. 'Be careful with this office,' I'd tell them. 'It's yours.' "

She made waves, too. After Carter came out against federal funding for abortion, she convened a meeting of angry administration officials to draft a private memo to the president. When the memo was leaked to the media, she faced public criticism and Carter's dismay.

"I knew I was sitting in the White House because of the work that the women's movement had done," Costanza said. "I just couldn't turn my back on women. I couldn't turn my back on all those sisters who didn't have the same opportunities their brothers had, who couldn't participate in the most basic guarantee of the American Constitution, which is self-realization."

Costanza is one of 34 local women whose experiences have been tapped for "Women Rebels," Eveoke Dance Theatre's latest offering, which previews tonight at the Lyceum Theatre.

Equally a tribute to some of history's most celebrated women and living local heroes, the piece deploys a cast of 30 dancers, and a soundscape of recorded music and interviews, to paint a portrait

of the endurance and commitment of women who have made a difference.

Choreographer Gina Angelique, a fire-in-the-belly feminist with a penchant for raw, dramatic storytelling, had originally planned to create a series of dance portraits of such inspirational historical figures as Isadora Duncan, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Harriet Tubman and Helen Keller. But as the project gelled, she began to ask herself some tough questions.

"I had made a series of dance portraits, which is probably the form I'm most comfortable with," said Angelique, referring to her evocative work on feminist icon Emma Goldman, Holocaust chronicler Anne Frank and folk legend Utah Phillips, among others.

"Usually when I'm working in comfortable territory, it's a sure sign that I'm screwing up."

Determined to dig deeper, the choreographer plunged into reading. And in the course of her research, she stumbled upon a passage that gave her pause. It suggested that the only way to honor women's past achievements is to take action in the present.

"That made me look at women who are working here, now, today," Angelique said.

Working the phones like a reporter, she came up with some names, which led to interviews, which led to other names and other interviews. The women were all local leaders – activists, politicians, artists, educators and businesswomen – who have worked to build a better world. After each interview session, most of which she conducted over the summer with her infant son, Shealyn, in tow, Angelique would emerge both humbled and invigorated.

"It was so incredible," Angelique said. "They all shared these amazing stories. I sat there during the editing process, surrounded by these reams of quotes, just wanting to scream, or cry. How could I leave anything out, and still do them justice? How could I honor their lives?"

To share their stories, Angelique created new dances and altered the historical portraits to reflect her local research. She devised a narrative arc, connecting the lives of female icons with those of local, unsung heroes. And she created a soundscape of music intercut with words drawn directly from her recorded interviews. In the process, the show got a lot bigger and morphed into a documentary form.

Like Moises Kaufman ("The Laramie Project") and Anna Deavere Smith ("Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992"), theater-world experimentalists who have used documentary material to paint portraits of various communities, Angelique has sought to let the interviews shape the work. Her favorite image, of a woman sewing a fist, was inspired by a conversation with Gracia Molina de Pick, a lifelong feminist who helped Mexican women win the right to vote.

"I knew that if women didn't get the vote, there would be no change," said Molina de Pick, whose two grandfathers were heroes of the Mexican revolution. "We used to get on soapboxes in the market and say, 'Nothing will be done without women.' That's how we sold it – not as freedom for women, but as a vote for progressive politics."

One theme that reverberates through "Women Rebels" is independence, a quality all her subjects share. "They think for themselves," Angelique said. At the same time, they have all labored to improve the lives of others.

"They cultivate. They nurture."

That's certainly true of Sandy McBrayer, who in 1988 founded the first school in America dedicated to teaching homeless children. A former National Teacher of the Year, she attributes her own success with Monarch School and in her current role as executive director of San Diego Children's Initiative to caring for, and believing in, the children she encounters.

"I can't imagine not trying harder," she said. "How can you look around and see people in need and not want to help?"

The Monarch School, which now serves more than 100 homeless students, started because "I met a kid who didn't have a home and he said, 'I have a friend like me, too.' I did what they needed. 'You're hungry? I can cook. You need clothes? I have a brother about your size.' "

Growing up in a large family headed by two Marines ("My first word was 'Sir,' and my second was 'Ma'am,' " she likes to say), McBrayer learned at a young age that "you did what you could and you did what you said, no excuses." She still holds herself to that standard.

"Life is short and death is long," said McBrayer, who has implemented free after-school programs for 20,000 local children through the Children's Initiative.

"Did you have fun today? Did you do something today? I ask myself that every single day. There are days I don't accomplish anything, but then I get up the next day and do two or three things to try to make up for it."

Determination is also a hallmark of Diane Takvorian, founder and director of the Environmental Health Coalition. An Armenian-American, she realized early on "that my family was murdered because people didn't like us," she said. "It helps you to realize what people are facing now."

Looking at environmental issues through the lens of social justice, she labors to improve conditions in poor neighborhoods, which are disproportionately affected by bad air, contaminated water and other environmental ills.

"Concrete accomplishments give people hope," she said of her organization's successes. "It's like Martin Luther King said: We have to take pride in the small accomplishments while despairing at what needs to be done."

What gives documentary work its vitality – whether in dance, drama, film or photography – is the tension between letting the real stories live in all their complexity and discovering how to make those stories resonate as art. But it also places a special burden on the artists who make it.

"The thing I'm most anxious about is how these women will respond (to 'Women Rebels')," Angelique said. "I made myself not think about it when I was making the piece, because that would kill it, but now that it's time to open, the nerves are kicking in."

Copyright 2003 Union-Tribune Publishing Company. Used by Permission