by John Weidman and Stephen Sondheim
Directed by Adam Brazier
A Birdland Theatre and Talk Is Free Theatre
Presentation at the Theatre Centre
February 4-21, 2010

   Trust Stephen Sondheim to shake up the American musical. In Assassins he turns the musical revue form on its head, sending shivers through John Weidman’s time-jumping and time-mingling libretto, parodying and manipulating various musical styles, and compensating for the lack of narrative tension by crossing eras and characters to find parallels and contrasts. Unlike Brecht, Sondheim does not put politics in the foreground even when he deals with political assassins, but he does not neglect the political and social issues or questions that his subject raises. Described by one critic as “an anti-musical about anti-heroes,” Assassins takes nine notorious American assassins or failed assassins of American presidents and explores their motivations within the context of the real or false American dream. And in the process, Sondheim evokes various sounds of American music, drawing from John Philip Sousa, Stephen Foster, barbershop quartet, country ballads, and hymns in order to further his sense of irony in counterpoint to the intended violence of the assassins. The setting is a carnival shooting gallery, and the first song is a jaunty tune with an ominous message: “No job? Cupboard bare?/One room, no one there?/Hey pal, don’t despair--/You wanna shoot a President?” Not your average Broadway musical opening, and certainly not your average musical sentiment. And with its casually eerie tone, it explodes all the false stereotypes of a genre that advocates of the “legitimate” theatre would like you to believe. No wonder the Great White Way was unprepared for this show on its debut in 2004, and no wonder the show still makes many theatre patrons uncomfortable.

   The assassins or would-be assassins on view range from John Wilkes Booth (Lincoln), Samuel Byck in a Santa Claus suit (Nixon), Giuseppe Zangara (FDR), and Leon Czolgosz (McKinley) to Lynette (Squeaky) Fromme (Gerald Ford), Sara Jane Moore (Ford), John Hinckley (Reagan), Charles Guiteau (Garfield), and Lee Harvey Oswald (Kennedy). Booth emerges as a sort of chorus at times—especially for Oswald—and the ghostly manifestations of all the title figures imparts a fascinating gothic quality, though the libretto and music balances the horror opposite black or wry comedy. In dealing with assassination, the falsehood of the American Dream (there is a remarkable sequence late in the show that invokes Miller’s Death of a Salesman), and the ironic trap of democracy and individual freedom (“Everybody’s Got The Right”), Weidman and Sondheim encapsulate in nine songs or numbers the promises and lies of America along with the injustices and indignities that explode into irrational violence. “All you have to do is squeeze your little finger,” goes an imperishable line in “Gun Song,” and I can’t think of a better retort to the execrable propaganda of the gun lobby. No amount of rhetoric could ever be a match for this pithy, witty libretto in this regard. And the carnival setting is perfect for the venting as each stalker gets to air an grievance in a particular musical style. So, the attempt on FDR is played out against the Sousa march “El Capitan”; the “Gun Song” gets a barbershop quartet; and Charles Guiteau’s death by hanging is preceded by a loud, vigorous cakewalk in which he mounts the scaffold with evangelical fervour. Savagery has rarely seemed so blithe.

   Of course, the disturbing brilliance does not obscure the fact the intellectual content is slight. Whether or not an assassin’s motive is social equality, everlasting love, total commitment to a false Messiah, the preservation of the Union, vengeance, the need to be appreciated, or book sales (as in “Another National Anthem”), this musical sometimes seems complacent about its own victory as a shocker. However, there is no fuzziness about its thrust: Assassins is brave, bold, and often boisterous. Theatrically it is a grenade thrown in the face of American complacency.

   Adam Brazier has directed with a firm hand on the tools to unlocking a social pathology. In one sense, it is not a difficult show to direct. Each villain has his or her show number, front and centre, and one song follows another with dash and natural polish. It is cabaret with cheek. Certainly, the small size of the Theatre Centre auditorium is tailor-made for this cabaret, and Beth Kates’s set and props turn economy into a virtue, just as Gareth Crew’s top lighting is wonderfully suited to the respective “turns” of the assassins. Erika Connor’s costumes are in perfect key, and there are few risks for the actors, beyond Brazier’s decision to have them play musical instruments, an idea borrowed from recent versions of Company and Sweeney Todd.  There is a scaled-down orchestration for the three-piece band, with percussion, bass, and second keyboard under the musical direction of Reza Jacobs, but this reduction in musical scale somehow works in this production's favour by accentuating the passages of gritty atonality and deliberate off-metre wonkiness. Brazier uses an extremely restrained technological resources, though he does resort to a little of the Zapruder film for Kennedy’s assassination, and at the end, the assassins line up facing and pointing their weapons at the audience, so that we become their target in a sort of macro pathology, but otherwise the show is rooted more in the psychological than the physical world. When not in a specific scene or sequence, the cast sits or stands on the rim of the semi-circular space, observing what transpires, but their being outside the action does not equate with any attempt to comment on their roles.

   In general, the acting is stronger than the singing. Martin Julien’s Proprietor gets his “carny” mannerisms down pat, but his singing is weak, especially in the crucial opening number. Geoffrey Tyler’s Balladeer has a sweet, low voice for his country ballads but he needs a mike, and his Oswald is not vivid enough, compromised, no doubt, by the context of the Texas Book Depository. However, Jay Davis’s stomach-cramping, immigrant bricklayer Zangara, Mike Ross’ Czolgosz (short on the Polish accent but firm on the social anger), and Christopher Stanton’s Hinckley, infatuated with pubescent Jodie Foster, are strong caricatures. Graham Abbey is superb as Sam Byck in a Santa suit, and his monologue—admittedly the best written speech in the show—rings potently as he tapes messages to Leonard Bernstein and declares that he is history in a flagrant challenge to the optimism of the American Dream. Paul McQuillan makes an interesting unbalanced but patriotic John Wilkes Booth, and is of great help in the surrealistic scene with Oswald. The finest male performance in terms of both acting and singing is undoubtedly Steve Ross’s Guiteau, massive in bulk and strength of voice, cakewalking his way to the noose and singing out his hallelujahs to “the Lordy” with the fervour of a mad evangelist. On the female side, Trish Lindstrom is a very effective “Squeaky” Fromme in a hippie dress, acting and singing with utmost sincerity and passion and becoming all the more dangerous for this. However, Eliza-Jane Scott’s Sara Jane Moore fails because her mental instability and nervousness are self-conscious comic effects rather than seeming organic to the character’s psyche. The rest of the ensemble (particularly Jonathan Tan) lends admirable vocal and physical support, and helps make this production a triumph for its seductive psychological exploration. When, as in the majority of instances, the cast connects with Sondheim’s music, the audience feels the real power of this jarring revue.   

photos: Guntar Kravis

pic 1 (L-R): Paul McQuillan (John Wilkes Booth), Geoffrey Tyler (Lee Harvey Oswald). In rear: Graham Abbey (Sam Byck)

pic 2 (L-R): Mike Ross (Czogosz), Jay Davis (Zangara), Trish Lindstrom ("Squeaky" Fromme), Paul McQuillan (Booth),
        Eliza-Jane Scott (Sara Jane Moore), Steve Ross (Charles Guitaau)



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