Black Rep founder and producing director Ron Himes is the driving force behind the Washington University Performing Arts Department’s current presentation of Ragtime: The Musical, which is based on the 1975 novel by E.L. Doctorow. The book is by Terrence McNally, the music by Stephen Flaherty and lyrics by Lyn Ahrens.
Doctorow’s novel focuses on three seminal groups of Americans before World War II and the complex personal, social, class and political relations that define them.
The musical follows Doctorow’s lead, while flattening the characters and giving short shrift to the virulent political economy (businessmen as robber barons and politicians as gangsters) of early 20th century America. It offers the possibilities of the American dream on a silver platter of success as power expressed through personal will and extravagant imagination.
Upper-class WASPs, African Americans and eastern European Jews are the three groups whose human strivings and interactions make up the cauldron that is Ragtime.
Coalhouse Walker Jr. and Sarah, his great love and the mother of his child, are the main African-American characters. Tateh, a Jewish-Latvian silhouette artist and his daughter, are the embodiment of the immigrant experience. The major WASP characters are Father, a somewhat naive businessman and explorer; Mother, his wife and subdued conscience; Edgar, their only child; and Mother’s Younger Brother, a confused and lost liberal intellectual.
Ragtime music provides the soundtrack – and also the secret spiritual dimension that makes the play more than a somewhat confused wish for a brighter day and an America that will finally manifest, in Lincoln’s words, “the better angels of our nature.”
The music, beautiful in its simplicity and supple ornamentation (anything but ragged), sometimes has the power to mute the unfairness, oppression and physical harshness of the environment as revealed. The clash of melodious ragtime and the brutal reality of industrial inflexibility, represented by the mass production of the assembly line, gives the play a dynamic and range that overmatches the acting and singing in this production.
That said, I must commend Himes and the mostly student cast for an exuberant and soulful attempt at making the play work. His direction is crisp and his actors are articulate and prepared, if at times a little stiff.
Shaun Hudson as Coalhouse was elegant and got stronger as the play progressed. I thought adding some edge to his personality earlier in the play would have made his eventual rampage more believable. His singing voice was almost up to the challenge of some very difficult theater pieces.
Mother, played by Renae Adams, was the largest and deepest character of the evening as she progressed from WASP trophy wife, to genuine Christian Samaritan, to effective businesswoman, to political analyst and strategist, to prophet and feminist icon in the magnificent song “Back to Before.”
Janessa Morgan excels in the role of Sarah. Her movement from a mute girl who abandons her child to the real hero of the play is impressive. Most of this is done with her beautiful voice and a killer smile. Although fated to become (spoiler alert!) the ultimate tragic presence in the play, her incredible poise and charisma trump the intended effect of her death and leave her alive in all our minds
The choreography (by the Black Rep’s Millie Garvey) and Bonnie Kruger’s costuming were nearly equal to the lovely musical score (directed and performed by the Black Rep’s Charles Creath).
The lighting (by Sean Savoie) was especially powerful in the second act as the confrontation between main character Coalhouse and the entrenched industrial power of the law begin to take on a rollercoaster life of its own.
The set (by Jim Burwinkel) was sturdy and gave a monumental feeling to the idea of an immigrant or a bumpkin arriving in this new world of steam and ash and dirt that operated ideologically with one purpose: to turn the natural world of men and beasts into capital.
Performances continue in Edison Theatre on the campus of Washington University at 8 p.m. Oct. 30 and 31; and at 2 p.m. Nov. 1. Tickets are $10 for students, seniors and children; $15 for faculty and staff; and $20 for the public. They are available through the Edison Theatre Box Office and through all MetroTix outlets. For more information, call 935-6543 or visit padarts.wustl.edu.
