“Parade” at The Carnegie (Covington, Kentucky) Reviewed by Rafael de Acha, April 5, 2013 Theatre Reviews Limited
"Parade" - Jason Robert Brown (music); Alfred Uhry (book ) A co-production of The Carnegie and the Musical Theatre Department of the University of Cincinnati’s College-Conservatory of Music. Dee Anne Bryll and Ed Cohen (Directors); Steve Goers (Music Director); Dana Hall (Scenic Designer); Wesley Richter (Lighting Design); Janet Powell (Costumes); Kevin Semancik (Sound Designer); Jillian Floyd (Wig and Makeup Designer) In the cast: Collin Kessler (Leo Frank), Jenny Hickman (Lucille Frank), and ensemble. At The Carnegie, Covington, Kentucky 5.4.13 (RDA)
The 1913 trial of Leo Frank, a factory superintendent convicted of raping and murdering a thirteen-year-old employee, is the subject of Jason Robert Brown’s "Parade." Brown’s music, set to his own words, and librettist Alfred Uhry’s deeply personal connections to this tragic story about anti-Semitism in early 20th century America’s South give a modicum of dramatic thrust and moral gravity to this stage work, but the authors should have considered turning this work into something other than a Broadway show, in which case "Parade" might have met with a more fortuitous reception from the 1983 Broadway critics and audiences. With its through-composed structure, rhapsodic ballads and sweeping choral numbers "Parade" longs to be something much grander and keep company with Bernstein and Weill, but at pivotal moments it appears to apologize for all its doom and gloom, and so throws in a little cakewalk or Boston Waltz or Lindy Hop to lighten the proceedings.
"Parade" is nearly three hours long. Uhry and Brown could have said what they now say and then say again and again in these two lengthy acts in the space of one single act filled with solid musical and dramatic ideas. Again and again "Parade" gets oh so near and yet so far from packing the kind of visceral punch which we all long for in a theatrical experience. When now and then the work achieves one of those few and rare moments that truly grab one in the gut, Brown and Uhry soften the blow and interpolate some quaint number or other about good ol’ Southern folks makin’ music. The results are dispiriting and deflating.
The 1902 Beaux Arts building that is now the Carnegie was initially a library and a meeting place for political rallies and for theatrical offerings of the time. Once designated by the National Register in 1971 as having historical value, its architectural integrity had to be preserved - both a blessing and a curse. The theatre space seats – one’s guess – around three hundred theatergoers, with the orchestra seats situated five or more feet below stage-level. The closer one is seated to the action (third row for me and my companion) the harder it becomes to watch the show without experiencing some eye and neck strain. The theatre’s management may want to explore some solutions to this problem, for theirs is a charming venue ideally suited to intimate theatrical offerings.
No stage work is ever truly finite, so here is "Parade," paraded back to life after its untimely demise at the hands of the implacable New York reviewers, in a new production, helmed by the fine work of directors De Ann Bryll and Ed Cohen, the excellent conducting of musical director Steve Goers and vividly realized by a cast of C-CM’s young talents.
The inspired pairing of Collin Kessler and Jenny Hickman as Leo and Lucille Frank anchors the drama. Kessler gives a hypnotic portrayal of the unjustly accused Brooklyn Jew transplanted to life in early 1920’s Atlanta – his demeanor appropriately uptight and rigid as that of a fish out of water, his ringing baritone ever supple and memorable: an insightful characterization from a young man years younger than the role he plays to the hilt. Jenny Hickman is the long-suffering, Georgia-girl wife with a spine of steel and a voice that ranges from a lovely mezzo to a pin-you-to-your seat belt and a “don’t you forget-it” wail on top. Among the other fine performers in the cast, Noah Ricketts is memorable in the role of the guilty Jim Conley, a coiled, convulsive chain-gang prisoner with fathomless anger, giving voice to the antagonist part in a clarion tenor.
At his rare best Brown’s music digs deep into our collective consciousness, especially in the two-person scenes for Frank and Lucille, in which the music hews closest to early 20th century opera in a mostly-tonal compositional style not far from the folksy idioms of Virgil Thompson and Aaron Copland. The lyrics are a good fit most of the time and, once-in-a-while, stunningly good as in All the wasted time, retaining throughout a colloquial, direct, essentially American working-class tone. At such moments Kessler and Hickman are completely convincing as singing actors, imbuing their work with utter sincerity and heartbreaking pathos.
Alfred Uhry’s book brings into relief the callousness and opportunism of the press that made the trial a media circus and the weakness and corruption of a legal system that repeatedly failed to uphold the law. Playwright Uhry’s uncle was the owner of the factory where Frank worked and, as a Jew growing up in Atlanta in the 1940s and 1950s, brings to this work the same unique insights about living as a minority in the American South that he brought to his plays The Last Night of Ballyhoo and Driving Miss Daisy.
When Frank's death sentence was commuted by Georgia Governor Slaton, Leo Frank was kidnapped, spirited to Marietta, Georgia, and lynched. The Jewish Anti-Defamation League came into being as a response to these events. Works like Parade keep the memory of these past horrors fresh in our minds, saying, “Never Again!” in the way only theatre can cry out such words.
Permalink | Posted by David Roberts on Sunday, April 7, 2013
CEOExpress
