Rose Weaver is a Rhode Island State treasure. This award winning actress, singer, songwriter, storyteller and playwright has enjoyed a career of honor and distinction, from Rhode Island to Los Angeles and back again.

But on a recent sunny September morning, she's was still a Georgia girl.

"I just put a peach pie in the oven," she said, from her home on the East Side of Providence. "I put the peaches in a brown paper bag so they're soft, but not too soft. I vary the recipe a bit, with cinnamon, a little tapioca corn starch, and then I cover the crust with egg."
"It's just like my mother and grandmother used to make."

Ms. Weaver grew up on a farm in Georgia, and she has never lost her appreciation for living off the land. "Nature, to me, is how people should be living; in harmony with each other."

These days Ms. Weaver gets her fix of the great outdoors playing golf, a game her late husband taught her back in the mid-1980's. She likes to play at local public courses, and just finished a refresher course with Russell Johnson, the pro at the Warwick Country Club, who she notes is the only black golf pro in the state of Rhode Island.
Ms. Weaver did not actually plan to go into entertainment — she enrolled at Wheaton College intending to study law. "I was just so tired of injustice, for my family, for the poor," she said. "I wanted to help."

"But I just kept falling asleep in those government and poly sci classes."

As one of the first black students to attend an all-white high school in Atlanta, then one of 12 black women of 1200 white, and mostly well-off students at Wheaton, Ms. Weaver was familiar with that feeling of "otherness" — yet it was what actually led her to her life's work.

"I auditioned for a play at Wheaton," she said. "Music and theater taught me how to speak and walk — and walk in other people's shoes."

Ms. Weaver's passion for justice was not diminished when she abandoned the idea of a legal career, she just began to express it through music and theater. "I've always said, arts saves lives," she said.

"I had just come from Georgia, and Martin Luther King was strong in my heart and head," she said. "Music is a unifier — and even though times have been difficult lately, I have friends from all walks of life, and we share our fears and talk; and one thing we've managed to talk about is our love for each other."

"In every walk of life you are going to find some bad apples, and some delicious ones."

In recent years, Ms. Weaver has embraced a pro-aging message, and her one-woman play Menopause Mama was a highlight of her expression of that message. One song from that play, titled This Woman's Not Done, resonates — especially when read out loud by the playwright herself. Here is an excerpt:

"First we were young, then too old

Kicked to the curb, robbed of our souls

Reached for the ceiling, hit the glass

Was either ‘bout gender, color or class
Some treated us good, others handled us wrong

At times we were weak, but now we’re strong

We’re singing our new song, we’re right on the track

And this train still runs

This train still runs

And we can’t turn it back

We can’t go back

Look into my eyes right now

Can you see I’m still here

There’s so much more of me to live

And I love we, I love me for all of my years

And this woman’s not done"

Rose Weaver and the Honeysuckle Rose Band will be performing at Linden Place on Saturday, Oct. 3rd at 4 p.m. for an al fresco afternoon of jazz, cocktails, and hors d’oeuvres in the historic gardens. From ballads, to shuffles, to the swing, the Honeysuckle Rose Band pays tribute to the passion and grooves of the time period in which these songs were created. Come and witness the voice that The Boston Globe states “has the rare ability to prompt laughter that turns into tears” while enjoying catered cocktails and hors d'oeuvres.

The performance takes place in the Linden Place gardens at 500 Hope Street, Bristol. Tickets are $85 and $75 for members and include table seating, cocktails and hors d'oeuvres. Reservations are required as social distancing rules are in place, and seating is limited. In the case of rain, the concert will be moved to the open-air Linden Place Ballroom. To purchase tickets, visit www.lindenplace.org or call 401/253-0390.