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Epic History Of Kentucky Takes To Stage
By James Scarborough
Robert Schenkkan’s “The Kentucky Cycle, Part Two,” directed by Trevor Biship for Cal Rep at the Armory, is riveting, monumental, powerful, panoramic, ambitious and wholly satisfying.
And long.
Three hours and 20 minutes long. In stage time it spans 85 years, from 1890, “Tall Tales,” to 1920, “Fire in the Hole,” continues through 1954, “Which Side Are You On?” and concludes in 1975, “The War on Poverty.” That seems about right in audience time, as well.
Not that it matters, though.
Given the Thanksgiving season as well as the potential of a New Deal (as opposed to a raw one) under President-elect Obama, it provides fascinating insight into the intersection of family and social history.
It continues the story began in Part One (1775 –1861), although both Parts can be seen independent one of the other. The four tales describe the beginning of the end of the Rowen family when Jed (David Vegh) and teenage daughter Mary Anne (Jocelyn Hall) fall under the sway of a silver-tongued devil, J.T. Wells (Jeremiah O’Brian) and Jed sells the mineral rights to his extensive acreage, not realizing (he signed the dirty deed with an “X”) that “usual and ordinary rights” permitted the scourge of his land and the slavery of his offspring.
Mr. Schenkkan’s theme is the immortality of narrative that, unlike coal, burns clean. He tells a story that in turn is narrated, winsomely, by the adult Mary Anne (Sarah Underwood). As the production makes clear, the only thing that survives over time is words. He has taken local history (The Rowens, a slice of Kentucky) and made it universal. He has made the story of a single family stand for the hopes and aspirations (and disappointments and bamboozlings) of a nation.
Struggle, squalor, generational decay, flashes of falling star dreams, hacking sighs of resignation, rebellion, heroism, betrayal and heartbreak (especially young Mary Anne Rowen’s — romantic delight in a towering oak and subsequent unromantic references to where the tree once stood). It’s all there, as the Rowans lose their land, and, when their dreams literally go underground, they also sell their soul to the company store.
Biship achieved his monumental direction through a minimal stage set (bravo, Staci Walters) that was nothing more than a planked square that demarcated interior, symbolized property boundaries (but not dreams), and set off the raised platform which served, ironically, as an elevated coal mine and a speaker’s dais (you go, Mother Jones! — Deborah Lazor). The acting was solid, seamless, and versatile. The award-worthy ensemble moved from hillbillies to wage slaves to union organizers to union bigwigs while maintaining a mystical (the last moment’s a lulu) connection to the land, their land that, in the end, was really no man’s land.
Performances are at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday and Thursday, Dec. 2 and 4, at 8 p.m. Dec. 6, 10, 12 and 13. The show — including Part One — runs until Dec. 13. Tickets are $15-$20.
The Armory is located at 854 E Seventh St. For information, call 985-5526 or visit http://calrep.org.
And long.
Three hours and 20 minutes long. In stage time it spans 85 years, from 1890, “Tall Tales,” to 1920, “Fire in the Hole,” continues through 1954, “Which Side Are You On?” and concludes in 1975, “The War on Poverty.” That seems about right in audience time, as well.
Not that it matters, though.
Given the Thanksgiving season as well as the potential of a New Deal (as opposed to a raw one) under President-elect Obama, it provides fascinating insight into the intersection of family and social history.
It continues the story began in Part One (1775 –1861), although both Parts can be seen independent one of the other. The four tales describe the beginning of the end of the Rowen family when Jed (David Vegh) and teenage daughter Mary Anne (Jocelyn Hall) fall under the sway of a silver-tongued devil, J.T. Wells (Jeremiah O’Brian) and Jed sells the mineral rights to his extensive acreage, not realizing (he signed the dirty deed with an “X”) that “usual and ordinary rights” permitted the scourge of his land and the slavery of his offspring.
Mr. Schenkkan’s theme is the immortality of narrative that, unlike coal, burns clean. He tells a story that in turn is narrated, winsomely, by the adult Mary Anne (Sarah Underwood). As the production makes clear, the only thing that survives over time is words. He has taken local history (The Rowens, a slice of Kentucky) and made it universal. He has made the story of a single family stand for the hopes and aspirations (and disappointments and bamboozlings) of a nation.
Struggle, squalor, generational decay, flashes of falling star dreams, hacking sighs of resignation, rebellion, heroism, betrayal and heartbreak (especially young Mary Anne Rowen’s — romantic delight in a towering oak and subsequent unromantic references to where the tree once stood). It’s all there, as the Rowans lose their land, and, when their dreams literally go underground, they also sell their soul to the company store.
Biship achieved his monumental direction through a minimal stage set (bravo, Staci Walters) that was nothing more than a planked square that demarcated interior, symbolized property boundaries (but not dreams), and set off the raised platform which served, ironically, as an elevated coal mine and a speaker’s dais (you go, Mother Jones! — Deborah Lazor). The acting was solid, seamless, and versatile. The award-worthy ensemble moved from hillbillies to wage slaves to union organizers to union bigwigs while maintaining a mystical (the last moment’s a lulu) connection to the land, their land that, in the end, was really no man’s land.
Performances are at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday and Thursday, Dec. 2 and 4, at 8 p.m. Dec. 6, 10, 12 and 13. The show — including Part One — runs until Dec. 13. Tickets are $15-$20.
The Armory is located at 854 E Seventh St. For information, call 985-5526 or visit http://calrep.org.
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