TUCSON (By Rogelio Olivas, Tucson Citizen) December 14, 2006 — Call it the passing of the olla. The time when a Mexican-American woman figuratively and sometimes literally hands her daughters the jumbo-sized family pot and teaches them how to make tamales.

In the Latino community not only do real women have curves – they also make their own tamales. It's an ability Latinas are proud of because preparing the Mexican staple requires skill, patience and stamina.

But the passing of the olla is becoming less frequent as younger Latinas shy away from the tamale-making tradition and the hours of labor that go with it. Many simply have lost interest or prefer to buy their holiday supply from the friendly man in the Safeway parking lot.

The Catalina Players dinner theater troupe hopes to rekindle that interest and revive the family tradition with its new play, "Las Nuevas Tamaleras (The New Tamale Makers)." In Texan Alicia Mena's comedy three 20-something, college-educated Chicanas decide on a whim to make tamales on their own for the first time.

With no Martha Stewart or Rosarita among them, the three need all the help they can get, so they light a candle and leave the situation in God's hands. The Man Upstairs responds by dispatching two angels, a pair of older and wiser Latinas from different time periods who are expert tamal makers. Through their thoughts, the pair convey instructions to the three clueless friends and help them avoid a disaster in the kitchen.

For first-time director Norma Medina, the bilingual play hits home because she remembers slaving away at the table, making tamales with her family.

"If anybody's ever been to a tamale event, they know that it's a whole-day event and that it's a lot of hard work," says the Salpointe alumna, 43.

But in the end the effort is a rewarding endeavor, Medina says, one that leaves special memories.

"It's a great time for family to get together, because you're going to laugh, you're going to fight, you're going to cry. You're going to solve the problems of the world."

Medina and producer Priscilla Marquez liken the experience to canning and quilting, cultural events that bring women together and create a special bond among them – and in this case make them laugh.

In the play, leader of the pack Sylvia (Stacey Castillo), pampered girly-girl Patsy (Ericka Quintero) and peacemaker Josie (Beba Machado) are trying to reconnect with their roots.

"They're taking the traditions of the past and creating the traditions of the future," Medina says.

But they can't do that without the assistance of their two heavenly helpers, Doña Mercedes (Alba Nora Martinez), a spirit from late 1800s Mexico, and Doña Juanita (Lourdes Machado), a Chicana from 1960s America.

The two spiritual mentors want to do more than just guide the young women; they also want to cook. But, according to Medina, "St. Peter won't let them, because when you make tamales and women get together, there's gossip, and St. Peter doesn't like gossip."

Gossip? Chisme? You bet, says actress Lourdes Machado, who recalls the women in her family sitting and standing around the table, talking about their relatives, neighbors and men as they prepared their Christmas tamales.

That – along with goofing around – helped add some fun to the laborious ritual.

"Before you knew it, someone would throw a little ball of masa at each other. So it was a playful kind of thing, she says. "And, of course, everybody would brag that my tamales are the best, or how crooked yours are or that one's too fat, you didn't put enough meat in it. You know, that kind of stuff."

Machado's participation in the play is art imitating life because her daughter, Beba, also stars in the production. So she is, in effect, schooling one of her children in the art of tamale making.

Beba probably needs it, too, because she admits that she and her college-age friends don't get together to make tamales. They do that only with their families.

But that could change. A friend who helped her rehearse her lines immediately connected with the play, says Beba, 23, a junior at the University of Arizona studying landscape architecture. Maybe that connection will spur interest and a desire to have a tamale-making party.

Medina hopes the play resonates with audiences as well and helps them see the value of family customs. "Your traditions are very important, she says. "There's a reason for them. They bring you closer together."

To get audiences in the mood for the play, Catalina Players is serving, you guessed it, tamales from Rigo's for dinner.