"HOWDY"
is about as friendly an opening line as a musical can get. Along
with some twangy guitar music and the broad, easy smiles
of an energetic cast, it heralds the start of a bright new
musical.
"Young Abe Lincoln" is
aimed at children 8 and older, but adults will enjoy sitting
through this hour, too. It's one of Theaterworks/USA's best
shows ever, a brisk and tuneful look at our 16th president
during his early 20s. It has the added distinction of being
a play about freedom that's being offered free.
We first meet young Abe speaking
out against a slave sale in New Orleans, then pick up his story
in 1830, as he moves from Indiana to Illinois with his parents.
He's 21 but has no idea what he wants to do with his life,
except that he doesn't want to become a farmer like his father.
He can read and write, which sets him apart from most people
he knows; he's considered well-educated because he's had a
year of schooling, off and on. He'll walk miles to get a book.
Later, the one law book he's read qualifies him as the best
person available to defend a teacher who may lose her job.
Fortunately he wins the case.
He had been on the verge of going home to his parents, after
suffering a crushing series of losses: his first election,
his job and a woman he loved, who died suddenly.
Playwright John Allen - who
wrote another
"Young Abe Lincoln" that launched Theaterworks in
1961 - has streamlined the story, seamlessly blending the personal
and the public. The show is slightly reminiscent of "1776," another
successful musical about the humans behind history.
Allen shapes the emotional ups
and downs so we get joy and sorrow, a hint of romance (scholars
are divided over whether Lincoln and Ann Rutledge, who died,
were courting or good friends) and a hopeful ending, in which
Abe finally finds his calling in the law.
A catchy song about being "on
our way,"
first introduced on the family wagon ride to Illinois, becomes
the musical's signature, marking Abe's various rites of passage.
Jeffrey Lodin's country-style music, which includes a knee-slapping
welcome by the citizens of New Salem, Ill., and even dares
a couple of ballads (rare in children's theater), matches the
snappy storytelling and director Ted Pappas' zippy staging.
Even Lincoln's campaign speeches
are transformed into a lively number as the actors race around
changing hats and locations to represent people of different
towns. Stefan Lingenfelter makes an appealing young Abe (too
handsome, but he's lanky and has a good voice), while the others
- Tony Freeman, Eugene Key, Rob Roznowski and Laura Stanczyk
- do wonders in multiple roles. Martha Bromelmeier's costumes
lend colorful touches.
With only five actors, it's
understandable that we don't glimpse siblings, nor does the
play clutter its themes by mentioning that Ma is actually a
beloved stepmother. In several scenes Abe is shown as unalterably
against slavery - which he may have been at the time, before
the realities of politics set in. At certain times Lincoln
advocated keeping slavery in the southern states to preserve
the Union and wrote in 1837 that, though slavery is unjust, "the
promulgation of abolition doctrines tends rather to increase
than to abate its evils"
(an interesting background to Supreme Court nominee Ruth Bader
Ginsburg's view that pushing pro-choice legislation too fast
produces backlash.) The play also makes a case for Lincoln
as an early feminist, which is certainly a surprise.
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