Susan Granger’s review of “Parade” (City Center)
Sometimes you’re in just the right place at just the right time. The Off-Broadway revival of the Tony-winning “Parade” opened at City Center on West 55th Street on Wed., Nov. 2nd and only played one week – through Wed., Nov. 9th. But I suspect it will return soon as a full-fledged Broadway production.
The moving, memorable musical by Alfred Uhry (“Driving Miss Daisy”) and Jason Robert Brown dramatizes a real-life miscarriage of justice in 1913 in Atlanta, Georgia, which resulted in the wrongful conviction and subsequent mob lynching of Brooklyn-born, pencil plant superintendent Leo Frank for the rape and murder of 13 year-old Mary Phagan.
Hal Prince’s original production was staged on Broadway in 1998. It then quietly languished until director-choreographer Rob Ashford revived it in 2007 at London’s Donmar Warehouse, re-imagining the show’s electrifying themes of government-supported bigotry against African-Americans and Jews, pitting these groups against one another, and the terrifying volatility of mob rule.
Now in a brief revival by Michael Arden (“Spring Awakening”), Ben Platt (“Dear Evan Hanson”) plays Leo Frank, married to Lucille (Michaela Diamond), a Southern Jewish woman. He is held responsible when the body of Mary Phagan (Erin Rose Doyle) is found in the basement of his factory.
Leo is arrested, along with his night watchman, Newt Lee (Eddie Cooper). But the prejudiced prosecutor, Hugh Dorsey (Paul Alexander Nolan) decides to go after eccentric, socially isolated Leo Frank. Kudos to Sean Allan Krill as the courageous Governor who eschews political ambition to do the right thing and re-open Leo’s case after his conviction.
The massive supporting cast includes Alex Joseph Grayson, Gaten Matarazzo, John Dossett, Jay Armstrong Johnson and Howard McGillin. And the City Center supported a 24-piece orchestra playing Don Sebesky’s original orchestrations.
What’s extraordinary is that Ben Platt remains on-stage and in character, even during the intermission.
Because of its brief run at City Center, I can’t urge you to see it but I can make you aware that it will probably return soon. Six years ago at New York’s Museum of Jewish Heritage, there was a discussion about “Parade,” focusing on how it’s even more relevant today as public figures often make anti-Semitic remarks.
So be on the lookout for “Parade” whenever and wherever it re-surfaces.