Time is right for ‘1776’: First-rate cast, savvy direction elevates Marriott revival
In his program notes for Marriott Theatre’s timely, entertaining revival of “1776,” Sherman Edwards and Peter Stone’s musical about the drafting of the Declaration of Independence, director Nick Bowling explains his vision.
He intended to capture “the fragmented political landscape, the spiraling nature of debate and the monumental task of upholding democracy,” challenges that confronted the Second Continental Congress and persist today.
That wasn’t his only objective in reviving this 1969 tuner, whose flawed, but mostly well-intentioned, characters are all Caucasian and only two are women.
Like Roundabout Theatre Company’s provocative 2022 Broadway revival whose racially diverse cast consisted entirely of female-identifying, trans, nonbinary and gender nonconforming performers, Marriott’s production aims to reflect the multicultural state of our union in the 21st century. To that end, Bowling assembled a racially diverse ensemble that also features women in roles traditionally played by men.
Both the Marriott and Roundabout productions examine history from the perspective of marginalized people. But I found Bowling’s nontraditional casting more subtle and his direction more discreet. And while the condemnations of bigotry and patriarchy are perhaps less obvious, they are impactful nonetheless.
One can’t say the same about the less-than-memorable score. However, it’s improved by a vocally impressive ensemble led by the formidable Tyrick Wiltez Jones, an exceptional singer whose impassioned performance as the independence-minded firebrand John Adams anchors this abridged history lesson.
Frustrated with delegates who refuse to sever ties with England, Adams enlists help from Benjamin Franklin (a nicely droll Richard R. Henry) and Thomas Jefferson (Erik Hellman), an amorous newlywed suffering from writer’s block who Adams taps to pen a declaration that will persuade their colleagues to support independence.
Ardent royalist John Dickinson (Heidi Kettenring, self-satisfied and self-controlled) opposes independence. Adams’ primary adversary, he and the other Southern delegates reveal their preference for land, cash in hand and “neatly ordered lives with well-endowed wives” over freedom in “Cool, Cool Considerate Men,” a chilling depiction of men who put personal interests above the national interest.
Other notable performances include Mary Robin Roth’s irascible, rum-loving Stephen Hopkins; Lucy Godinez’s jolly Richard Henry Lee; and Katherine Alexis Thomas’ beautifully sung, self-assured Abigail Adams, whose duets with Jones make for the show’s loveliest moments.
Jay Westbrook, a 2023 high school graduate, plays a courier who delivers to the congress dispatches from General George Washington. His unvarnished performance of “Momma Look Sharp,” a dying soldier’s plea to his mother, is a sobering testament to the staggering price ordinary folks sometimes pay for politicians’ decisions.
But the production’s most unsettling, enduring moment comes courtesy of Matthew Hommel, who plays South Carolina slave owner Edward Rutledge. Hommel delivers a tour-de-force performance of “Molasses to Rum,” a savagely operatic reflection on the United States’ original sin that indicts the northern colonies for their complicity in the trafficking of enslaved people.
