By: Skip Sheffield
The freaks have overtaken West Boca Raton High School and we mean that in the best possible way.
Slow Burn Theatre’s production of “Side Show” celebrates oddities, aberrations and mutations in music and song. The musical, by Bill Russell and Henry Krieger ran for just 91 performances on Broadway. It is onstage only through Sunday, Feb. 10 in the Performing Arts Auditorium, so catch it while you can.
The story centers on Daisy (Kaela Antolino) and Violet (Courtney Poston), characters based by real life conjoined English-born Hilton twins. The girls were inextricably joined at the hip, but in the show they are able to separate temporarily for dramatic purposes.
“Side Show” is a miraculous example of getting maximum results from minimum resources. The cast is large (17) yet lavishly costumed by Rick Pena, who also plays Buddy, a struggling musician who discovers the twins in a carnival sideshow drags his friend Terry Connor (co-director Matthew Korinko), an Orpheum Circuit vaudeville scout, to see the act.
Connor instantly sees the commercial potential in the untrained twins. Buddy and Terry convince Daisy and Violet to leave the carnival to achieve their star potential.
The greedy carnival boss (Conor Walton) fights and threatens them. Their best friend Jake (Jerel Brown) asks them to stay for reasons of his own, but he agrees to let them go when they say he can come with them.
Daisy and Violet, like the twins on which they are based, are two separate and distinct personalities forced to share the same corporate body. Daisy is more ambitious and star-struck. Violet yearns for love, romance and a conventional marriage. This inevitably leads to conflict, as it did for the real-life Hilton sisters. Dreams are expressed in “Like Everybody Else” and “Feelings You’ve Got to Hide;” reality in “The Devil You Know, “Who Will Love Me As I Am?” and “I Will Never Leave You.”
“Side Show” is also about exploitation. America is in the depths of the Depression and people are desperate to do anything for a buck. In the case of the Hilton sisters that includes staging a very public wedding ceremony.
As in real life, the ending of the Hilton Sisters’ story is bittersweet. This show thankfully does not follow it all the way to its sad conclusion. Instead it is uplifting in an odd way, celebrating strong souls who triumph over handicaps.
The singing in this show is simply beautiful with gorgeous harmonies by the entire ensemble, backed by an unseen but very responsive onstage band. Both Kaela Antolino and Courtney Poston are strong singers. Poston is particularly strong in her projection, but she throttles back to felt perfectly for her “twin” duets.
Choreographer-director Patrick Fitzwater and his plucky troupe are truly miracle workers. The theater community lost a lot over the past year, but the future burns bright for “Slow Burn.”
Tickets are $30-$35. Call 866-811-4111 or go to www.slowburntheatre.org.
“Raisin” a Modern Classic at Palm Beach Dramaworks
Palm Beach Dramaworks specializes in contemporary theater classics, artfully and soulfully realized.
A perfect example of this is their production of “A Raisin in the Sun” by Lorraine Hansberry.
Hansberry made history in 1959 as the first African-American and youngest playwright (29) ever of a Broadway play. The director, Lloyd Richard, was the first African-American Broadway director. Sadly “Raison” was a one-hit wonder for Hansberry, who died tragically young of pancreatic cancer at age 34.
Hansberry’s career grew posthumously. Her writings were adapted into a stage play and later a book called “To be Young, Gifted and Black,” which was a success in the 1968-1969 Broadway season. “Raisin” was adapted into the single-word musical production, which won the Tony Award for Best Play in 1973. Bruce Norris wrote “ClybournePark” in 2010 in response to “Raisin.” It had its Florida debut at Caldwell Theatre and won a Carbonell Award as Best New Play for the final season of that company. It went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 2011 and Tony Award for Best Play in 2012.
Guest-directed by Seret Scott, “A Raisin in the Sun” is a largely autobiographical story of how Hansberry’s family broke the color barrier of a Chicago suburb.
Hansberry fictionalized her family name to Younger. Walter Lee Younger (Ethan Henry) is a proud, hard-working but sometimes hard-drinking, reckless family man. Ruth (Shirine Babb) is his strong, supportive, forgiving wife. Daughter Beneathe Younger (Janice Abbott Pratt) is the closest character to the playwright: whip-smart, ambitious and full of righteous indignation over racial prejudice. Joseph Asagai (Marckenson Charles) is Benethe’s Nigerian-born exchange student friend and George (Jordan Tisdale) is her boyfriend. Travis Younger is the 10-year-old son, played by Mekiel Benjamin and Joshua Valbrun in alternating performances. The family matriarch is the regal Ruth (Pat Bowie, made up to look much older).
Act One is mostly a simmering, ominous setup for the fiery Act Two. Ruth’s husband has died, leaving a $10,000 insurance policy to the family. Ruth wants to use the money to finance a down payment on a house in ClybournePark, a previously all-white suburb. The rest of the money will go to help finance Beneathe’s college tuition and family expenses. Walter has other plans, cooked up with his shady friend Bobo (Micley LaFrance).
Everyone’s plans are put in jeopardy by Karl Linder (David A, Hyland). Smiling obsequiously, Karl claims to be head of the welcoming committee for the Clybourne Park Improvement Association. The only improvement the committee really wants is protection of the value of their homes against feared loss if a black family moves into the neighborhood.
Act Two is a conflagration resulting from a foolish decision, a senseless loss, and dire consequences. Each character has his or her chance to bare his or her soul. The results are spectacular, particularly with piteously grieving, regretful Walter and devastated Beneathe. In the final analysis, it is the quiet, stoic power of grandmother Ruth that gives the play its dramatic charge, wonderfully realized by Pat Bowie.
If you want to see a ground-breaking, modern classic, look for farther than “A Raisin in the Sun.” It runs through March 3 at 201 Clematis St., West Palm Beach. Tickets are $55 ($10 students) and group rates are available. Call 561-514-4042 or go to www.palmbeachdramaworks.org.
Captions: (top) Raisin (bottom) Side Show