Big River
Adapted from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain; Music and Lyrics by Roger Miller, Book by William Hauptman, Directed by Spiro Veloudos; Music Director, Jonathan Goldberg; Choreographer, Rachel Bertone; Scenic Design, Janie E. Howland; Costume Design, Rafael Jaen; Lighting Design, Scott Clyve; Projection Design, Seághan McKay; Production Stage Manager, Robin Grady; Assistant Stage Manager, Nerys Powell
CAST: Jordan Ahnquist, Leigh Barrett, Peter A. Carey, John Costa, Marchant Davis, Zachary Eisenstat, Paul D. Farwell, De'Lon Grant, Kevin C. Groppe, Maureen Keiller, Nicholas Lee, Joseph Marrella, Nellanna, Daniel Plimpton, Alycia Sacco, Kami Rushell Smith, Marlon Smith-Jones, Erica Spyres, Phil Tayler, J.T. Turner, Chelsea Williams
Performances through October 8 at The Lyric Stage Company of Boston; Box Office 617-585-5678 or www.lyricstage.com
Spiro Veloudos is a large man who has chosen, of late, to let his Lyric Stage Company productions reflect the magnitude of his artistic appetite. Last year, he directed the massive undertaking that was Charles Dickens' The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, which received critical, as well as audience, acclaim and took home five IRNE awards. The Producing Artistic Director is making a big splash in this new season with the 1985 Tony Award-winning Big River, a musical adaptation of Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, featuring twenty-one Boston actors and an eight-piece orchestra conducted by Music Director Jonathan Goldberg.
Like plying the mighty Mississippi on a raft, it takes strength, wits, daring, and more than a little bit of luck to successfully pull off a mission of this complexity, but Veloudos has a great cast and crew supporting him. The designers along for the ride are Janie E. Howland (set), Rafael Jaen (costume), Scott Clyve (lighting), and Seághan McKay (projection). Howland and McKay combine their talents to magically create the illusion of the raft in motion on the river on the Lyric's compact stage, adding an unexpected authenticity to the journey of Huck and his traveling companion Jim, the runaway slave.
In the annals of American literature, Mark Twain plays second fiddle to few; still, the humor and spirit of his novel are richly augmented by the music and lyrics of Roger Miller, the '60's "King of the Road," whose folksy sensibility blends effortlessly with Twain's story. Big River is both story and character driven, and book writer William Hauptman and Miller have made sure that the adaptation serves to flesh out these familiar folks with an emphasis on their inner journeys. The score opens with the full company singing "Do Ya Wanna Go to Heaven," laying the foundation for the quandaries that follow about right and wrong, sin and forgiveness.
Jordan Ahnquist (Huck) and De'Lon Grant (Jim) are a well-matched pair as the clever boy running away from women who want to civilize him and the drunken father who wants to beat him, and the savvy slave trying to own himself and his family. As much as they are escaping, both are running toward something - freedom, adventure, and the fulfillment of a dream. Huck is the personification of the author (who wrote in Life on the Mississippi that it was his ambition to be a steamboatman [sic]) and represents the change that a disappointed Twain hoped to effect in the world after the Civil War and Reconstruction. Ahnquist both narrates and acts out Huck's stories, infusing them with an engaging mix of wonder and triumph. His boyish appearance affords him some credibility, but one recalls that Finn, as written, was a young teenager. Grant plays Jim with a mature bearing that contrasts with Ahnquist's exuberance to underscore the difference in their age and status. However, their chemistry is at its best when the two men are joined in purpose and song in "Muddy Water" and "River in the Rain." Huck Finn would be unknown to the world if not for his inclusion in Twain's earlier work, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Turnabout is fair play and Tom figures prominently in some of these escapades. Phil Tayler exudes the joy of being a boy with an overactive imagination and charms us even when his Tom occasionally overacts. And, speaking of overacting, in a Pinocchio-like turn of events, Huck falls under the tutelage of a pair of grifters played to the hilt by J. T. Turner (The King) and Peter A. Carey (The Duke). At first they appear to be stock ridiculous caricatures, but in the hands of these fine actors, The King hardens into a mean-spirited crook and The Duke develops a conscience and garners a small measure of sympathy.
