They help turn John Mark Jernigan into Hinckley while the polyester pants suit worn by Haldeman make you see the overwhelmed mother inside the would-be killer. The smoke-filled theater is dramatically lit by Ryan Finzelber and David Covach’s smart costumes give you a sense of time and place. And you don’t want to miss a word of Sondheim’s lyrics or even Weidman’s sometimes long-winded storytelling. The cast members don’t use microphones, which shouldn’t be a problem in the intimate surroundings of the freeFall Theatre, but anytime an actor turns away from you, the words get lost.
It’s a particular problem with Wells and Britt Michael Gordon as an otherwise commanding Booth. as Guiteau and Robert Teasdale as the overworked Czolgosz.īut it’s frequently difficult to hear the actors over various sound effects and the well-balanced band led by musical director Michael Raabe. There are some fine performances throughout, from the passion and fire of Pasqualino Beltempo as Giuseppe Zangara to the spirit of Alan Monhey Jr. Susan Haldeman is terrific as Moore, and a good match with Marissa Toogood as the Charles Manson follower Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme, two women who bungled their efforts to shoot President Gerald Ford. In between songs there are darkly comedic and sad scenes involving Thomas Mothershed as Samuel Byck, a tire salesman in a Santa suit who talks of crashing a plane into Richard Nixon’s White House.
That balladeer, played in a charming manner by Lucas Wells, becomes Oswald, a link in the chain as the ghost of Booth talks him into pointing a gun he intends to use on himself in a different direction.
We’re told early on that “everybody’s got the right to their dreams,” even if that means the tragedy of assassination. Sondheim’s smart and frequently catchy score is written in a mostly folksy style with a friendly narrator/balladeer introducing the audience to Booth, Czolgosz (who killed William McKinley) and Charles Guiteau (President James Garfield) among others.
0 kommentar(er)
