September 13, 2007
Arden Does Assassins
Just back from the first preview performance of the Arden Theatre's production of the Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman musical Assassins.
While it's not fair to review a preview performance, let me just say that I loved it. An extremely strong cast, both dramatically and vocally, combined with some imaginative staging made for an immensely satisfying evening. This is an Assassins worth seeking out.
Director Terrence Nolen used a bare bones cast with each actor having multiple duties performing in the crowd scenes and the smaller parts such as Emma Goldman. He even made use of the John Doyle gimmick of having the actors play instruments on stage. This all worked much better than I expected it to.
The eight-piece (I think) orchestra sounded better than such a small ensemble has any right to sound, although some of the balances between the orchestra and singers could be improved.
All the cast members were wonderful, but I'll single out Jeffrey Coon as John Wilkes Booth, Scott Greer as Sam Byck, and James Sugg as Charles Guiteau for special mention as being especially outstanding. Of course, they each have some outstanding material to perform.
The Arden did its usual trick of rearranging the performance space. This time they used a thrust stage with plenty of projections of still photos and motion pictures. I especially liked how Nolen staged the Garfield assassination, and "The Ballad of Guiteau" had a very satisfying and unexpected "button".
Not everything worked and certainly some adjustments will be made. I've not always been happy with the Arden's Sondheim productions, but this may turn out to be one of their best. I'll probably try to visit it again after it officially opens next week.
One minor sour note: in the Arden's otherwise excellent program notes there is a big howler. Describing Lee Harvey Oswald's attack on JFK they say "he fired a single shot at Kennedy." Maybe they were thinking of (and misinterpreting the meaning of) the single-bullet theory.
Posted by jt at September 13, 2007 10:38 PM