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Show: Assassins
Society: Chichester Festival Theatre (professional)
Venue: Chichester Festival Theatre, Oaklands Park, Chichester, PO19 6AP
Credits: Music and Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim Book by John Weidman
Type: Independent (registered user)
Author: Alexander Wood
Performance Date: 07/06/2023
Assassins
Alexander Wood | 09 Jun 2023 21:07pm
Reinvented Assassins Hits Every Target
Photo:Johan Persson
In Sondheim and Weidman’s musical Assassins we are introduced to the extraordinary ragbag of characters who wanted to kill a US President. Starting with John Wilkes Booth – ‘the pioneer’ – and ending with John Hinckley, the poor sap who thought he would win over Jodie Foster by killing Ronald Reagan. Every character has a motive of sorts. Guiteau, a mixture of delusion, self-regard, religious zeal and blinding ambition shoots and kills Garfield who he deludedly believes has promised him the US ambassadorship to France. In a protest against the exploitation of the workers Leon Czolgosz kills President McKinley. Actor Booth had a genuine anger about Lincoln and the Civil War he led against the South – or was it some bad reviews that flicked the switch for him? And so on.
Their stories are presented with humour and, it has to be said, a degree of sympathy. After all, the Declaration of Independence, the foundation for the great experiment in democracy which is the United States, promises ‘Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness’ – making it the only country which guarantees its inhabitants a right to happiness!
In one way or another this is something Assassins‘ characters are decidedly lacking.
The show is scripted to be presented in a fairground. I have seen excellent productions at the Chocolate Factory and the Watermill in this setting.
But in a brilliant stroke of genius Chichester’s latest production, directed by Polly Findlay, is very different.
There’s a fairground feel outside the auditorium (popcorn, hot dogs, hamburgers and lots of red, white and blue) but once inside, the audience finds itself in a US party convention. Dancers in stars and stripes costumes wind up the crowd (has a Sondheim show ever seen the whole audience clapping along ‘on demand’ before the show even starts?) while big screens promise that the ‘live stream’ will commence soon. Red baseball caps are very much in evidence. And then a countdown, with the audience joining in enthusiastically ….
3..2..1…..
And the presidential figure (Peter Forbes, impressive throughout as The Proprietor) appears, in (Rhinestone!) stars and stripes tie, thumbs-up, waving, pointing, smiling, smiling, smiling…then, in an echo of the 6th January insurrection he happily hands each of the would-be assassins (in modern dress) a gun and invites them to play their role in history – costumes for their historical characters in boxes with their names on them downstage.
The contemporary feel of the production is brought home by three television reporters (Liam Tamme, Lizzy Connolly and Samuel Thomas), as three Balladeers, replacing the lone one in the original version.
This is an Assassins for the Trump Era. And I loved it!
It’s undeniably an ensemble piece.
That said, Danny Mac, who moved from television to stage a few years ago, puts in a super performance as John Wilkes Booth. The ‘first assassin’, he tells his story, then through the course of the show takes on leadership of the group; the scene with Lee Harvey Oswald (Samuel Thomas) so poignant and strong.
Nick Holder gives extraordinarily powerful voice to Samuel Byck, a comic/tragic character who feels cheated by the American Dream. He has two monologues – the second, a huge tribute to the writing of thirty three years ago which seems to foretell the desperately sad state of politics today in the USA and, as it happens, in the UK too.
And the ‘double act’ of Lynette ‘Squeaky’ Fromme (a runaway, desperate to impress cult leader Charles Manson played by Carly Mercedes Dyer ) and Sara Jane Moore (a five-times married leftist who worked for the FBI for a time, played by Amy Booth-Steel) – a fictionalised pairing of two very ineffectual ‘assassins’ of Gerald Ford, made me laugh a lot.
Harry Hepple demonstrates impressive movement and comic skill as the delightfully eccentric character of Charles Guiteau.
But without a doubt the whole large cast, some doubling/trebling up, are spectacularly good. And the band, resplendent in their red caps, impress too.
The Presidential Office set and the use of the big screens create a great backdrop to the whole show.
Assassins at Chichester Festival Theatre runs until 27th June 2023 – so good you’d be mad to miss it!
By Alexander Wood