Playwright: Alfred Uhry ( book ), Jason Robert Brown ( music/lyrics ). At: Writers Theatre, 325 Tudor Ct., Glencoe. Tickets: 847-242-6000; WritersTheatre.org; $35-$80. Runs through: July 2
Parade is an exceptional production and vehicle and you should rush to see it, although its dark based-on-fact story is challenging.
Parade unfolds in Atlanta just before World War I, where a young man was sentenced to death for murdering an adolescent white girl; a conviction achieved through suborned witnesses, unsubstantiated accusations, rampant bigotry and yellow journalism. Aware of the tainted trial, Georgia's governor commuted the sentence and doomed his political career. The exonerated murderer was taken from jail and lynched. Typical Southern justice in 1913-1915, you might say, except the lynch victim was white. Leo Frank also was a Jew originally from New York City. Such was Atlanta's anti-Semitic fervor that the only other suspect, a Black man, became the star witness against Frank.
Leo Frank hardly makes a fun night out, which is why popular success eluded this exceptional 1998 Broadway show. A smaller revised 2007 version has been more successful in the United Kingdom and the United States, and it's this version that Writers Theatre presents, guided with assurance and insight by director Gary Griffin, music director Michael Mahler and choreographer Ericka Mac.
Parade is somewhat opera-like, not because it's nearly through-scored but because unrelenting tragedy is more customary in opera than in musical theater. Opera embraces oversized blind passions of which Parade has plenty, especially among its antagonists. In contrast, Leo is self-contained and emotionally aloof, a personality trait used against him. The most compelling figure is his wife, Lucille, whose love for Leo and pursuit of justice finally awakens his love for her.
Of course, Parade isn't an opera, which is apparent from its musical diversity. Jason Robert Brown skillfully blends typical Broadway song forms ( ballads, anthems, song-and-dance using standard end-rhymes ) with early 20th-xentury marches, waltzes, ragtime, lullabies, hymns and chain gang songs all splendidly played and sung.
Patrick Andrews ( Leo ) and Brianna Borger ( Lucille ) begin as an odd couple—perhaps intentionally as Borger towers over Andrews—but become passionate lovers. Act I is about the murder and trial, Act II is about them. Veteran Kevin Gudahl ( prosecutor Hugh Dorsey ) only grows better with time and really exercises his singing chops. Jonathan Butler-Duplessis ( star witness Jim Conley ) stops the show twice in an award-worthy performance. Newcomer Jake Nicholson also scores musically and dramatically as the murder victim's would-be beau. There's not a slouch in the bunch.
Early 20th-century Atlanta was not known for anti-Semitism. Obviously, it was simmering underneath, needing only enablement to surface. Similarly, Donald Trump—as candidate and president—has enabled overt bigotry to surface and hate crimes to increase. Perhaps Parade is, ironically, a musical "to make America great again."
