By Jason Romney
Play: Assassins
Music and lyrics: Stephen Sondheim
Book: John Weidman
Based on an idea by Charles Gilbert Jr
Director: Roger Hodgman
Cast:
The proprietor of a shooting gallery: Steve Kidd
Leon Czolgosz: Greg Stone
John Hinckley Jr: Anthony Weigh
Charles Guiteau: John McTernan
Guiseppe Zangara: Jon Bode
Samuel Byck: Bruce Myles
Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme: Christen O'Leary
Sara Jane Moore: Heather Bolton
John Wilkes Booth: John O'May
The Balladeer: Mathew Dyktynski
Emma Goldman: Deanne Flatley
Billy, Sara Jane Moore's son: Jarrod Factor or Rian McLean
Lee Harvey Oswald: David Adamson
Set designer: Tony Tripp
Costume Designer: Anna Borghesi
Lighting Designer: Jamieson Lewis
Musical Director: Jean McQuarrie
Choreographer: Ron Challinor
Assistant Director: Sioban Tuke
Production co-ordinator: Ian Cookesley
Stage manager: Pam McDonald
Assistant stage manager: Lea Trowbridge
Sound recording: Kerry Saxby
Assistant to director: Kris Stewart
Production photographs: Jeff Busby
Duration: 80 mins without interval
Season and venue: The Fairfax, Victorian Arts Centre, 10 February to 1 April, 1995
Synopsis: A musical and satirical overview of US political assassinations
Rating: ****
Notes:
Helen Thomson's review was published in The Age, 17 February, 1995. Thomson begins by applauding the way Sondheim has developed the musical, generally, as a "vehicle for satire, for protest, for thinking about the hard questions, not for time-out from real life".
She notes that Assassins seems to suggest that shooting presidents is "inevitable" rather than "aberrant" given the points she goes on to make about the nature of American society and political culture.
She says that the play's structure is more like "a revue" or "Brechtian" and that there are numerous ironic echoes of Sondheim's earlier works. Thomson goes on to track the role of irony in making this musical so "unsettling"; she praises the productions emotional and intellectual complexity, concluding that the production has "everything you hope for from good theatre; it is surprising, challenging, entertaining, disturbing, thought-provoking, moving".
It is interesting to compare Thomson's estimation of the cast ("(the director, Roger Hodgman) has elicited the best performances from his actors that I have ever seen from them") with Jeremy Vincent's comments in The Australian, February 17.
Vincent, overall, is very positively disposed towards the production, saying it is "perfectly placed" in The Fairfax theatre, and that it "makes good use of very little".
Vincent says, however, that "there are some weaknesses in this ensemble, especially in the depth of delivery of the biting lyrics, when performers are also struggling to maintain an assured American accent".
Although Vincent praises the performance of many of the assassins, he points out that, for example, Matthew Dyktynski, the balladeer, "at times lacked the authority to oversee all the happenings through the decades".
While I did not see the same opening night performance as (presumably) was seen by Vincent and Thomson, I must concur with Vincent's views on the quality of the performances. While Bruce Myles in particular was, as usual, outstandingly good, and many other assassins achieved memorably excellent performances, the production was generally uneven in this respect even a week or so after opening.
Overall, however, I thought Hodgman's direction was pleasingly tight (important in any revue-style performance), the set by Tony Tripp was neatly evocative and Sondheim's music and lyrics are very entertaining, particularly for those who have a taste for the more macabre side of American culture.