While the script hasn’t changed, the voices telling the story of “1776” in the national touring production are quite different than those of the Continental Congress members portrayed in the Tony-winning musical.
The cast of this production, coming to the San Jose Center for the Performing Arts May 16-21, is made up of women, nonbinary and transgender actors playing mostly male characters. (Abigail Adams and Martha Jefferson are the two female characters in the show.) The cast is also more diverse, with a majority of people of color, in contrast to the all-white cast of the 1969 premiere production.
“This cast wouldn’t have been considered when the Declaration of Independence was written,” says Liz Mikel, who plays Ben Franklin. “All these people were here then, (and we) reflect what America looks like today.”
In researching Franklin, Mikel discovered that he was a master chess player.
“He was always three steps ahead of everyone else,” she says. “He was always one of the wisest people in the room, but I don’t think he’s pompous about it.”
A slaveowner at the time the Continental Congress convened, Franklin would eventually become a staunch abolitionist. The issue of slavery was hotly debated by the men who signed the Declaration of Independence, and clause attacking slavery was ultimately removed from the document to help guarantee that delegates from Southern states, as well as those from Northern states who represented slave trading interests, would be on board with it.
The musical addresses this compromise in “Molasses to Rum,” sung in this production by Kassandra Haddock as Edward Rutledge.
“Having Black bodies on the stage while the song is being sung—the impact of that makes a lot of difference,” says Mikel, who is Black. “It’s a compromise that was made to get the country started, and it allowed the atrocity to continue.”
The show also addresses the violence and loss of war in the song “Momma, Look Sharp,” sung by a soldier who routinely delivers messages from George Washington’s Continental Army camp. It was originally intended as a protest against the Vietnam War, but Mikel says it resonates differently in the era of Black Lives Matter.
“As a Black mother and grandmother, it touches my heart,” she adds. “I love my grandson, but society doesn’t aways see his beautiful self; they see a Black man.”
Mikel has been with the show since it was developed and premiered by the American Repertory Theater at Harvard University before playing on Broadway with Roundabout Theatre Company at the American Airlines Theater from Sep 16, 2022 – Jan 8, 2023. While some audience members prefer the traditional cast, she says others embrace the change.
“On Broadway, I can’t tell you the number of people who came up after the show and said, ‘I saw the original. I didn’t think I’d enjoy this as much, but the message landed even harder.’”
While that message might not always be uplifting, Mikel says it’s important to focus in the not-so-fun facts about the birth of the nation.
“We want to show America in all its complexity—the good, the bad and the ugly,” she adds. “We can’t just think, ‘America is beautiful,’ and not grapple with the other aspects.”
That the members of the Continental Congress did their fair share of grappling is evident in “1776.”
“They were all from different places and backgrounds, and they were coming into the room to come to an accord,” Mikel says. “That’s what we do every night.”
Broadway San Jose presents “1776” May 16-21 at the Center for the Performing Arts, 255 S. Almaden Blvd., San Jose. Tickets are available at broadwaysanjose.com, 408-792-4111 or the San Jose Civic Box Office, 150 W. San Carlos St., San Jose.
Source: www.mercurynews.com