Can I get a Witness?
Theater
Kids and the Ku Klux Klan make for an unsettling mix. When author
Karen Hesse confronts this conflict in her young adult novel Witness,
it makes for a powerful story filled with tension and fear. It’s 1924 in
small-town Vermont.
Leanora Sutter, a young African-American, and Esther Hirsh, a Jewish girl, face
the hatred of the Klan. The town has been divided along the lines of loyalty,
those who stand with the Klan versus those who stand against it.
Weather-beaten wood creates the frame of a barn; chairs and boxes
scattered across the floor complete the play’s barren environment. Forlorn
fiddle music haunts the air as Jenique Hendrix as Leanora dances onto the
stage. Many of Leanora’s classmates refuse to dance with her in the school’s
pageant. Merlin van Tornhout (Peter Cayer), a young man hoping to impress the
Klan, storms out on the performance, complaining that he can’t get “the smell
of her out of (his) nose, the soot of her out of (his) eyes.” It is with this
bleak set, this lonesome music, and this hate that the play opens.
Each citizen takes the stage to tell his or her part of the
story, to offer individual perspectives on a shattered town. The local grocery
owners, Harvey (Greg Byrne) and Viola Pettibone (Linda Loy), debate joining the
Klan to increase business. Sheriff Percelle Johnson (Bill Gossin) struggles
with the Klan’s lawlessness. The Reverend Johnny Reeves (Michael Jensen
Phillips), a supposed man of God, fights demons of pedophilia and racism. Iris
Weaver (Stephanie M. Roosa), restaurateur and bootlegger, attempts to prove
herself an independent woman in the face of worrisome times. And Reynard Alexander,
the town’s liberal newspaper editor-in-chief, attempts to hold on to his ethics
in the face of threats.
It is Leanora and Esther (Elizabeth
Criddle) who take the brunt of the Klan’s attacks. Esther, a native New Yorker,
is moved to Vermont
by her father, a widower who hopes to raise Esther in the country air. They
move in with a local spinster, Sarah Chickering (Virginia Flavin), who falls in
love with mothering the little girl, adopting her as her own. When the Klan
decides to chase the Sutters and the Hirshes out of town, the girls are forced
to grow up fast and to rise above the fray.
Adapting a novel into
a play seems to have been a difficult task in the case of Witness. The narrative has been transformed into a series of short
monologues delivered by actors who rarely directly interact. Director Patricia
Lewis stages the actors in observation, studying each other from individual
perches. When Esther, in an attempt to reunite with her dead mother, sits on the
tracks waiting for an oncoming train, Leanora must jump on Esther to save her.
The girls pantomime the save, moving sympathetically, but never touching.
The lack of interaction, of simple eye contact or touch, makes
for a cold experience. Of course, when the characters do touch, the warmth of
those moments is powerfully tender. The lack of connection and the plodding
pacing makes the production tedious. Although the play is based on a novel for
young adults, it would take a very patient child to triumph in watching.
Hendrix and Criddle are talented young
ladies. Their performances are engaging, enchanting, and professional. Both
girls shine in their characterization.
Unfortunately, accents and speedy delivery, in combination with
the vernacular and acoustics, made the dialogue difficult to understand.
Additionally, a few of the actors who play characters imperative in
communicating the message of the play are unsure of their lines. When so many
characters come together to share their stories — stories that are
interrelated and add up to a complete understanding of the play — it is
essential that all of the actors not only know their dialogue, but the
intention behind the words.
As in most young adult literature, the bad guys get their due and
the good guys are rewarded. However, the moral of the play is disappointing in
that the conflict and violence that so permeate the story are tidily wrapped up
in the end.
Witness | through December 17 |
Shipping Dock Theatre, Visual Studies Workshop, 31 Prince Street | $12-$22 |232-2250 | www.shippingdocktheatre.org.
This article appears in Nov 29 – Dec 5, 2006.
