Month: September 2016

Long may he reign?

Mike Bartlett’s deliberately (and delightfully) Shakespearean King Charles III is a history play about things that haven’t happened yet. It’s also one of the more interesting, and innovative scripts to make rounds in ages. It begins with somber candles, and a sad eventuality — the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II who, in real life, is still very much alive, but a relative short-timer at 90-years and ticking.

In a twinkling England has changed and everybody — Prince Charles especially — wonders what it means to have a King in Buckingham Palace.

Things get tense right away when Charles is presented with a privacy bill that, to the old man/new monarch’s way of thinking, undermines press freedom and, in doing so, looms as a serious threat to English Democracy. Law requiring the royal autograph, real though it is, has come to be regarded as ceremonial, and when the required signature is withheld, a crisis ensues that threatens to boil over into anarchy. And that’s just the beginning. Charles knows history and the law, so when the politicians seek to neuter him, he raises the stakes in a big, big way.
[pullquote-1] Here is a play where politics is practiced by master craftsmen and rude brawlers alike while the royals get on with a proper game of thrones. Prince Harry (Jared H. Graham) struggles to reconcile his disposition with birthright and responsibility, while media darlings William and Kate learn how to leverage their own authority as the reigning “King and Queen of column inches.” Bartlett presents it all in Shakespearean verse, with special working-class dives into prose. It’s tribute artistry fine and rare, and so much more than just stunt writing.

As directed by Dave Landis, Playhouse on the Square’s Charles III is smart, but sharper than it is crisp — full of vigor and clever, history-winking design, but badly organized in spots that could and should make jaws hit the ground. As long as one thing is happening on stage at a time the sailing’s smooth, but stagecraft lists freeform and sloppy whenever the set’s enormous staircase is packed with party people or protesters.

Actors struggled with lines opening weekend, but for all the rough edges the end result was still something to cheer about.

As Charles, James Stuart France had the heaviest load to bear, and the most trouble matching words to action. But when he was on he was on, and very much the evening’s sad star — risking the crown to save Democracy. Charles finally catches his elusive dream, stepping into a role he’s spent a lifetime preparing for, only to discover he’s arrived late to party in last season’s frock.

Jamie Boller is infinitely watchable as Kate, much beloved of the camera. Bartlett imagines her as a less ghoulish iteration of Lady Macbeth driving William (Ian Lah) as he trips and lunges toward glory.

And what about the media who, over the course of the play turn (Brooke Papritz) an ordinary girl’s life into a circus shame-show because she had the good/bad fortune to get on with a Prince? Playhouse’s production never pulls this thread hard enough to make audiences’ second guess Charles’ problematic, but moral position; a position informed by his own complicated relationship with the British press. He’d been the King of column inches too, when Diana was by his side, and none of that turned out well for anybody. Now the doomed ex-princess’ ghost wanders through this bleak parody, with a punchline on her lips. It only sounds like prophesy. 

Monarchy in the UK: Charles III Rules Playhouse on the Square

Juicy character work abounds. Tony Isbell and Michael Gravois are the conservative devil (doing the Lord’s work?) and liberal angel (fallen?) whispering treason and hateful policy in the King’s royal ears. Isbell’s the opposition leader, playing all sides; Gravois the Prime Minister, prepared to go nuclear if he has to. Christina Wellford Scott’s also quite fine as Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall. It’s a smaller role compared to the heavy lifting she’s performed in shows like Doubt and The Lion in Winter, but it’s pivotal, and one of the best things she’s done in a long time. She might even be having fun.

Charles III’s awkward moments will probably stay a little awkward. The rest will tighten with repetition, and from edge of seat suspense to meditations on the meaning of celebrity, it was all pretty tasty to begin with.

Once in a while the Tennessee Shakespeare Company gives the bard a rest and turns its considerable talent loose on a completely different set of classics. Fall finds the Shakespeareans working with an adapted version of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird — a short-list contender for great 20th-Century American novel. 

Given the source material’s powerful brand, and the fairly recent hubbub and scandal over its posthumous “sequel” Go Set a Watchman, there’s not much point in recounting the story or its cultural impact. Instead, enjoy some special video cast interviews created by Jillian Barron and the good folks at TSC. 

‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ Closes this Weekend

What was really at stake when baseball was integrated and Jackie Robinson became the first African-American to play in the Major Leagues? That question drives Ed Schmidt’s brief, argumentative drama Mr. Rickey Calls a Meeting. It’s slippery too. Much trickier than you might think given how the history’s usually presented. Schmidt’s bracing historical fiction, which opened solidly at the Hattiloo Theatre last weekend, only scratches a scant bit deeper, but good creative archeology’s been done here, and there’s a whole lot of illuminating artifact in the short, shallow trench Mr. Rickey digs.

The push to integrate major league baseball didn’t begin with Jackie Robinson. Lefty journalists and activists campaigned to make the national pastime look more like the nation for years. Even in the Jim Crow era, this was inevitability, so in the mind of Baseball exec Branch Rickey, the question turned from when it would happen, to how it might be allowed to happen. Rickey’s answer: One man — to test the waters — others to trickle. So Mr. Rickey Calls a Meeting becomes an engaging, often entertaining study in American exceptionalism.

With America’s first African-American president preparing to leave office while folks who look like him are in the streets protesting the same old never-ending shit, this play feels like it’s landed right on time. 

Branch Rickey wants everything perfect for Jackie Robinson’s big rollout. He knows what to expect from the white community, and it’s not pretty, so he’s carefully selected a squeaky clean player who’s agreed to remain passive and pleasant in the face of spitting, name calling, violence, whatever. But resistance to integration came from within the African-American community too, and with good reason. While promoting a black baseball hero who smiled in the face of adversity, might create opportunities for similarly dispositioned individuals, it would be a major league victory for white hegemony, per usual, sending devastating shockwaves through the African-American sports and business community. So — and this is where the fiction takes over —  one of baseball’s great innovators — a man sometimes called “Mahatma” — calls a meeting of what today we’d call “influencers.”  Summoned guests on his list include an aged Bill “Bojangles” Robinson who’s still dancing to make ends meet, broke boxing champ Joe Louis, and actor/activist Paul Robeson who’s flat not having any. Rickey wants them to say nice things to the media and guard against inconvenient protests that could threaten Jackie’s chances in the majors. So the titans assemble (along with a resourceful bellboy) in a cramped room at the Roosevelt Hotel. There they sip cherry sodas, shoot the shit, scrap like contenders, and, in a faint echo of the Medieval mystery play, act out all the reasons not to trust Whitey. 

Everybody at Mr. Rickey’s summit understood what it meant to be exceptional, rising to the top of their fields while other African-Americans struggled — and still having to enter through the rear of public buildings. Mr. Bojangles, depicted near the end of his life, had been a Civil Rights champion and the highest-earning black performer in America. But the elderly dancer, with an owner’s stake in Negro League Baseball, was on the ropes financially and assailed by critics for performing stereotypical roles. Louis — the Brown Bomber — was similarly down at heel, and too familiar with the day-to-day indignities black men faced regardless of achievement. Robeson, by contrast to everybody else in the room, was  an active Communist who didn’t trust the myth of individual achievement. He worries the success of Jackie Robinson and the relatively few players called up to the big show comes at the expense of other people’s jobs and entire careers. He believes it will result in the ultimate failure of the Negro League, ceding all the power in baseball to white ownership. Who will go to the games when all the stars have gone away, he asks, wondering what will become of the people who sell tickets and concessions, and maintain fields, and so on. Then he makes a fair counterproposal.

Instead of one man at a time, how about one team at a time — black-owned? There are no spoilers here since we know the outcome, but the big ideas roiling through this cage match of a play make it exciting to watch as it swings for the fences on it’s way to its historic conclusion.

The Hattiloo’s production is sturdy, but rough at the edges at the preview performance I attended. It looked like it could stand another week of rehearsal instead of just a day, but all signs pointed to a production growing into what it needed to be. When the actors are more confident with lines and cues, this one promises to give off sparks. It’s a strong ensemble led by journeyman actor Ron Gephart as the titular Mr. He’s joined by Mario Hope as the bell hop, Frank Johnson as Bill Robinson, Emmanuel McKinney as Louis, Courtney Williams as Jackie Robinson, and Jonathan Williams as Robeson.

McKinney feels miscast here, but show’s once again just how good a character actor he can be. As Louis he spends much of the play detached, either listening, or self-distracting, but when he engages it’s fierce, game-changing, and alternately threatening and intensely humane. It’s another great performance from an actor who doesn’t seem to know how to do it any other way. 

Williams seemed to struggle most with lines, but crackled when he his his marks. 

As directed by Dennis Darling, Mr. Rickey is a fantastic example of Hattiloo doing what it does best by providing Memphis theatergoers with a clear alternative. Although more musicals are creeping into its seasons there’s still a strong commitment to drama and this is a good one.