Susan Granger’s review of “To Kill A Mockingbird” (Shubert Theater on Broadway)
While Aaron Sorkin adaptation is basically faithful to Harper Lee’s beloved 1960 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, delving into race, justice, bigotry, compassion and forgiveness, it’s a subtly revisionist version.
In the prologue, the youngsters Scout (Celia Keenan-Bolger), her older brother Jem (Will Pullen) and their friend Dill (Gideon Glick) are in what appears to be a barren, old, dilapidated building, wondering about what really happened on the night Bob Ewell (Frederick Weller) died. Did he really fall on his own knife? To persistent, often petulant Scout, something doesn’t add up.
Suddenly, Miriam Beuther’s stylized set design evolves into a 1934 Maycomb, Alabama, courtroom, complete with an elevated judge’s bench, jury box, and witness stand with adjacent spectator seats.
At the defense table is Tom Robinson (Gbenga Akinnagbe), a black laborer who has been falsely accused of beating and raping 19 year-old Mayella Ewell (Erin Wilhelmi). At his side (with his back to the audience) sits his defense lawyer Atticus Finch (Jeff Daniels), known as the most honest man in town.
Atticus firmly believes you can’t really know someone unless you climb into someone’s skin and inhabit it. He firmly believes in the fundamental goodness in everyone, even hate-filled Ku Klux Klan members. There are good people on both sides, he insists, echoing Donald Trump’s remark.
Atticus excuses Bob Ewell’s virulent racism by saying he recently lost his job and explains a cantankerous neighbor’s prejudice because she’s sick and stopped taking her morphine. During the course of the play, Atticus’s beliefs in the nature of decency are sorely challenged.
Working with director Bartlett Sher (“South Pacific,” “My Fair Lady”), Aaron Sorkin (“The Social Network,” “Moneyball,” “West Wing, “The Newsroom”) not only makes the timely connection between Jim Crowe Maycomb and contemporary Charlottesville but he also amplifies the role of Finch’s outspoken Africa-American maid, Calpurnia (LaTanya Richardson Jackson).
In addition, Sorkin injects Dill’s oddball best-friend character with Truman Capote’s unmistakable characteristics, including memories of being locked in his room while his mother went husband-hunting.
How does the play compare with the iconic 1962 movie, starring Gregory Peck? The most jarring change is casting adults as children; Celia Keenan-Bolger is 41. Although the actors are talented, I found the loss of childhood innocence very disconcerting.
“To Kill A Mockingbird” runs 2 hours and 35 minutes with one intermission, and if you leave your seat for any reason during the performance, you are not allowed to return.