Arts & Society

Gary Tischler • September 12, 2013

Just when you thought you had gotten tired of Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln, and Mary Todd’s seamstress Elizabeth Keckley and Steven Spielberg’s “Lincoln,” along comes Tazewell Thompson’s deeply affecting new play “Mary T. and Lizzy K.” And you are moved all over again.

Watching Naomi Jacobson as Mary Todd Lincoln, Sameerah Luqmaan Harris as Keckley, Thomas Adrian Simpson as Lincoln as well as Joy Jones as Ivy, Keckley’s youthful assistant at the Kogod Cradle at Arena Stage makes you at times think of the omni-present film, but it is, of course, hardly like watching the movie.

Thompson, a director at Arena Stage for many years, has done something almost unimaginable: he has re-imagined, re-shaped our views, pictures and feelings about these familiar and iconic people who loom so large in our memory’s imaginings without traumatizing long-held feelings. “Mary T. and Lizzy K.” is a labor of digging deeper, closer to the heart and bone about not only the history-held people but also our notions about them and the larger shadows of slavery, race, obligation and married love and marriage, intimacy and friendship. This production becomes for the audience something personal and intimate—we all have our feelings about these subjects and these people, certainly Lincoln and his wife Mary Todd, singular and together, and certainly race. All of us will see on stage some part of our joys and wounds and confusions of thought.

The relationship between Mary and Lizzie seems to front and center here. The two have, in a way, as much an intimate relationship as the Lincolns did. No one seems more intimate than the woman who pulls, pushes, contours and shapes a dress to the body, which is what Keckley did for all of the Lincoln’s White House years. She did so well enough that she herself gained some measure of fashion fame that was available in that day.

We see Mary Todd Lincoln in the drab, prison-like clothes of an asylum patient or inmate and Keckley, splendid in outbursting dress, has come to visit and to demand payment from Mary for all her years of work dressing the first lady, for which she was never recompensed.

This is in some ways a time machine play, a memory play. Soon enough, we are back on the night—victory won, war is over—that the Lincolns are preparing to go Ford’s Theatre. In the scene, they are unaware of Lincoln’s last night alive. There are fittings, there is Keckley’s assistant Ivy affectingly telling the story of her rape and there is Mary’s boiling jealousy over one, any and all.

The narrative—really in some ways a series of soliloquies, long stories and arguments and exchanges—returns infrequently to the asylum, to the making of accounts, to the ties that bind between Keckley and Mary Todd where even arguments over fashion and style can bring out wounding words.

When Lincoln—performed with a burst of gusto initially by Thomas Avery Simpson (he was Colonel Pickering in the recent Arena production of “My Fair Lady”)—makes his first appearance the play threatens for a moment to become “Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd and Lizzie K and Ivy.” He appears to be not only trying to win over all three women but the audience as well.

When Lincoln and Naomi Jacobson in a bravura performance as Mary launch into a knock-down, drag-out brawl—very much like that between Daniel Day Lewis and Sally Field in the film—it is just as shocking, only more so, because they threaten to involve us, spill off the stage like fighters in a ring.

But the steady rock throughout these proceedings—it’s more than an hour-and-a-half without intermission—is Sameerah Luqmaan Harris as Keckley. She has horror stories and points of view and losses, but she brings them to the forefront obliquely with grace and tart, dark humor. Even when she is in a scene merely watching and listening, you always sense her presence. Check it to see what is happening in that intense but serene and beautiful face. This woman is shy and very judicious with her emotions. She is watchful and observing at all times. When she breaks out with her view of heaven, it’s like a burst of sunlight bathing us all. It’s an accomplished performance—accomplished with few obvious tools.

If you’ve seen the movie “Lincoln,” this play will once again show up the obvious—that being here is different than being at the multiplex or watching a DVD. However brilliant, for instance, the performance of Daniel Day Lewis, it is locked up forever. At Arena, this Lincoln seems to be emerging before our eyes. You become in the theater a witness, not a consumer.

Thompson writes beautifully, with no fear of poetry, and with great compassion for human suffering—even the thoroughly combative and paranoid Mary Todd gets her glorious due here. The play is aided and abetted by Donald Eastman’s set which is at once functional and contains hidden wonders. Tt’s a place of starkness with left-over physical discarded memories—a trunk, curtains and boxes and briefcases, containing the stuff for dressmaking and discovery.

Wherever you sit during the course of this play, it seemed to me and felt to me, that you were only an emotion away from wanting to be a little closer, to help them, as they try to stop the story from moving forward to its appointment and to its opening scene. [gallery ids="101222,145137,145134" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

The Restaurant Association Metropolitan Washington announced the finalists for the “Oscars of D.C. Restaurants” at a March 19 event at the Hamilton emceed by Kelly Collis and Tommy McFly of Fresh FM.” The annual restaurant awards will be bestowed at the gala at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel on June 23. This year’s theme is “Restaurants in Bloom.” Incoming RAMW President Kathy Hollinger hailed the individuals who have made D.C. a “dining destination” and recognized Clyde’s of Georgetown with the Milestone Award for 50 years of continuous operation. The awards recognize excellence in 16 categories including Casual Dining and New Chef of the Year. The public votes on three categories including Hottest Restaurant Bar Scene. [gallery ids="101215,145018,145012,144989,145008,145003,144996" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

Barton and Leslie Gordon graciously hosted a May 23 luncheon at their Kalorama Residence as Pen/Faulkner celebrated James Conway’s Nose, a novel and insider’s view of life in Napa Valley. The author, who previously wrote a Washington Post wine column, shared that, as a Memphis native, he sampled Thunderbird. Ambassador of Liechtenstein Claudia Fritsche said, “I am deeply grateful to be taken out of the diplomatic world and thrown for a few hours into the literary world.” The non-profit brings together American writers and readers in a wide variety of programs to promote a love of literature. [gallery ids="101324,151371,151367,151357,151362" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

Princess Selene Obolensky, American-born and titled by her marriage to the late Prince Alexis Obolensky of Russian nobility and Chief of the State Department’s Russian Translation Section, who helped draft arms-reduction treaties at a tense time in U.S.-Soviet relations, was celebrated by her many friends on May 28. She is the founder of the grand Russian New Year’s ball, which benefits “Children of Berezichi,” residing at the Boarding Schools for Special Children in Ulianova and Sosenskaya, Russian Federation. [gallery ids="119170,119153,119137,119145,119165,119159" nav="thumbs"]

Gary Tischler •

There was some head scratching in the seats when the Kennedy Center made Hungarian playwright Ferenc Molnar’s “The Guardsman” its 2013 centerpiece theater production.

The play—written in 1910 by Molnar, who is also known for plays such as “Liliom” which became the basis for Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “Carousel,” had a reputation as something of a warhorse, date and rarely produced, famous mostly as a popular vehicle in the 1920s for the star couple of Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne.

Well, thank God for this war horse, and thank the Kennedy Center for letting us enjoy it in unexpected ways. Thank translator Richard Nelson, who saw the depth and theater magic in the original, and director Gregory Mosher, who staged the newly reconstructed play with flair, panache, and an ear and eye for the world of the theater and those who inhabit it. Especially, thank the actors who may not be all that familiar to theatergoers but who manage the difficult multi-tasking the parts require, by making us see and appreciate not only the nuances in the play, but its heart-breaking dangers.

Of course, “The Guardsman” could have been a door-slamming, laughter-inducing comedic blast—and it remains, still, very funny, but it’s the kind of laughter that’s always loaded with the potential for disaster for the characters and brings an acute tension to the proceedings.

The plot sounds labored—a couple, identified only as the actor and the actress, have reached an impasse in their marriage which the actor fears has gone stale. Now, as we see the two of them bicker and bite at each other in a turn-of-the-century drawing room, a nuanced air of something-about-to-happen has entered their lives. The actor—handsome, excitable, fretful—has imagined that his wife, cool, beautiful, famously restless—may be growing tired of him or falling out of love with him. He confides in their friend, the critic, who has also always been in love with the actress, that he thinks she’s looking for something, perhaps a military type, a “guardsman.” “I’ve seen him,” he tells his friend. “How do you know that?” he’s asked. “Because it’s me,” he replies.

So begins the plot and ploy—the actor will impersonate the guardsman and try to seduce his wife. If he fails, he will “be the happiest of men.” But if not, well: disaster, tragedy, heartbreak, the end of love. But it’s also “the role of my life.” And so he proceeds, popping by in full popinjay regalia at the house (the actor is supposed to be away on a tour), and then pushing forward by visiting the actress at an opera performance (of “Madame Butterfly”) where she’s gone, with her long-time assistant she calls “mother,” who’s always disapproved of the actor.

What ensues, is remarkable, a portrait of two people who have engaged in a passionate high-stakes game where everything matters painfully so on several levels. It’s a kind of war which opens with a big battle and works its way to a kind of irresolute resolution that is perfect for our times. These two are capable of great passions and loves—they’re, after all, gifted and famous actors on the stage when that really meant something. They love themselves, they love each other—maybe—and they love, perhaps more than anything, what they do, which is acting.

Here is Finn Wittrock as the actor—grandly afraid, unsure of what will happen, blustering with big feelings and big gestures. Here is Sarah Wayne Callies, so cool, if not cold, a hot iceberg floating in uncertain waters. Here are the actor and the actress, keenly observed by Shuler as the critic who has a stake in this uncertain game.

This is, of course, what actors do every night—they lie to us by making us believe what they’re doing is real and important every time out, that it’s as fresh as an honest kiss, which is what the actor wants from his wife.

If you’re interested in theater, you should go see “The Guardsman,” and watch what happens. The audience, I noticed, after a quiet beginning, steadily got into the grand deception as if they were at the racetrack with something to win or lose. When the couple kissed at one point, you could hear a voice in the back yell, “Yes!”

I second that emotion.

“The Guardsman” runs at the Eisenhower Theater in the Kennedy Center through June 25. [gallery ids="119161,119167" nav="thumbs"]

Jordan Hellmuth •

Fashion lovers and philanthropists alike flocked to Fusion de Filantropia & Fashion Show June 6 to support the American Diabetes Association’s National Capital Area Step Out to Stop Diabetes.

It was a night of fashion, community and philanthropy, hosted by Stacy Adams and her personal fitness training business, Fitness Together, in the center of Georgetown Court between Prospect and N Streets. The event featured displays of Mark Roscoe Design’s custom neckwear and fine women’s couture line, followed by an after-party fashion show at Karen Millen on Wisconsin Avenue.

Chicago-based couture designer Mark Roscoe, who has been involved in the fashion industry for 30 years, is also still a full-time, practicing trial lawyer. His family, among those of others in attendance, has been greatly affected by diabetes. Fifty percent of the items purchased or ordered from his Roscoe’s line and other proceeds, including privately donated items from the evening, benefited the American Diabetes Association.

Among those present were celebrity guest host Paul Wharton of Paul Wharton Style, Michelle Obama’s makeup artist Carl Ray, L.A. writer Liz Fraley, fresh off of covering the Cannes Film Festival, former NFL player John Booty and Rokas Beresniovas of the Georgetown Business Association. Those sporting Roscoe Designs ties included ABC7’s Scott Thuman and Mr. District of Columbia 2012 Hirsh Singh.
[gallery ids="101329,151478,151472,151467,151462,151457,151452,151447,151442,151437,151488,151430,151492,151425,151496,151483" nav="thumbs"]

Gary Tischler •

Back in 1985, Peter Sellars, who was director of the long defunct National Theater at the Kennedy Center, created something of a stir with his production of Anton Chekhov’s “The Seagull,” which included an all-star cast headed by Colleen Dewhurst, Kevin Spacey, Kelly McGillis and Paul Winfield, among others.

The problem was not in the stars, but with other things: a shrill score by Scriabin, a set that included a Mark Rothko-like backdrop and a prop—a droopy stuffed animal-like seagull, containing the play’s major metaphor—were among the controversies of the production, not a first for this sort of thing for Sellars. People even argued about what the meaning of changing the title from “The Seagull” to “A Seagull” might be.

Twenty-eight years later, there’s a new take and mash on Chekhov’s masterpiece by playwright Aaron Posner at the Woolly Mammoth Theatre. How’s this for a title change? “Stupid F—–g Bird.” You know what we mean to write.

Posner, best known here as a director, has taken Chekhov’s play as a kind of starting point, muse and model, to play with, to send up, and blow up at times, taking care to let you know that this is a play-specific play, if you will. He uses the specific play and its author to say a few things about how we live, create and play and love today, very much today. Along the way, his characters have a lot to say about performance and theater and art, but appear as in the original, befuddled, wounded and totally befuddled about love, the who and why and why not that are as destructive to an artist or playwright, as writer’s block.

“SFB”—this acronym will have to do—is a minefield of a play. It makes you metaphorically speaking afraid to put your foot and your feet down because your expectations—reasonable ones, one and all—are continually blowing up in your face. Posner is mindful of Chekhov’s soul and his creation—a series of the glasses-and-beard large images of him fill the walls on stage—but he’s hardly kissing butt in homage here. He’s created the same characters—some are omitted—as in the original, and they behave in the same ways and have to cope with the same triangulations of love. But they are also in the here-and-now, most of the time—the original is not exactly being copied, it acts as an echo.

So, here again is the frustrated, rebellious young son of the supremely regal but nervous famous actress. Here is the innocent but provokingly beautiful Nina. Here’s the why-am-I-old uncle and brother. Here is the famous, somewhat cynical and attractive writer. Here is the mismatched but settling couple. Here are Cam, Emma, Doyle, Nina, Sorn, Mash, and Dev. Here, briefly, fulfilling his role as metaphor is the SFB.

“SFB” both operate on two levels: it’s a play about art and the artist in society and the search for new forms, and it’s a play about the crying-out-loud-painful difficulties of love. In addition, “SFB” is about theater and plays today and turns almost into a bullfight with the audience. The characters step right through the third wall and make the audience play with the play or participate. At one point, Com, the young son of the famous actor stops and turns to the audience and asks for advice on what to do with his desperate love for Nina, who’s fallen for Doyle, the famous writer who is also the lover of Com’s mom. After some hesitation, they give him such advice as “ignore her,” “forget about her” and so on.

These sorts of things keep happening. Masha, (the miraculous Kimberly Gilbert), sings a song while playing the ukulele about modern life (it apparently sucks) in a sweet, knowing voice, or the characters sit facing the audience, explaining what each wants, or we’re offered an aftermath roundup characteristic of television melodramas. This is heady, affirming stuff—not exactly new—and it makes co-conspirators out of the audience. Yet it sometimes co-authors, always an unpredictable thing.

The Woolly crowd—and director Howard Shalwitz—thrive in this sort of thing. It’s like their very own private theatrical swimming pool and sauna. You can’t get hurt when you have the likes of Gilbert—who always manages to wring her own sort of poetry out of a matter-of-fact delivery that is secretly and deeply weird. Consider Masha, Cody Mitchell, who makes self-satisfaction seem warmly attractive as Doyle, the always savy Kate Eastwood-Norris as Emma, the diva mother/actress, Katie DeBuys, who adds an extra-step depth to Nina, and Darius Pierce (as Dev who married Mash, who loves Com) and Rick Foucheux as the wondering Sorn. If you get irritated with Brad Koed as Con, it’s because the part is written that way. Con is the wounded art revolutionary as whiner, both in the romantic and artistic sense.

It’s tempting—because, for instance, that Sellars production of “A Seagull” was a deeply affecting one to me—to feel offended with Posner’s rough handling but also sometimes awe filled respect of Chekhov. Instead, I think “SFB” is a kind of fantastic, giddy sea voyage, always half a second away from shipwreck. It’s smart. It’s funny and wise, knowing and fearless, most of the time. But you have to wonder, too, if it’s a little too smart. All this inventive, interactive staging, this reliance on the colloquial—as in “Start the f—–g play” or “This sucks”—seems a little too easy. It’s both deft and anarchic at once. We’re seeing both Chekhov’s and Posner’s “Seagull,” one never far from the other. In a way, “The Seagull” is a kind of safe harbor for “SFB.” You can always return home and be moved.

Jordan Hellmuth •

It all started at a poker game. Leroy Justice front man, Jason Gallagher, went to a poker game in Manhattan’s Lower East Side with his brother-in-law. From then on, Gallagher “kind of became the Neil Young to their Crazy Horse.” Despite the evolution of Leroy Justice’s sound, with each change up it “always sounded like us … like Leroy Justice,” Gallagher said.

Returning to D.C., Gallagher and the band hope to reunite with former band member, Michael Kelly, who stars in “House of Cards.”

“I think we’re just figuring out how to get our music to people,” Gallagher said. “I think we can win people over if we can get our music to new people. That’s why we play shows.”

What’s next for Leroy Justice? The five-member, New York-based band will be making its way down to D.C. club, DC9 on June 20 for the Monk Czech Release Party (Dominion Brewing & Dawson’s Liquor Beer Collaboration).

“If you haven’t seen us live, you haven’t seen us,” explained Gallagher. “If you haven’t seen us live, you don’t know Leroy.”

For ticket information for Leroy Justice’s show at DC9, visit www.dcnine.com

Mary Bird •

An opening night celebration at Hillwood Estate, Museum & Gardens on June 4 showcased the elegant life style of Marjorie Merriweather Post. Guests enjoyed an outdoor reception before proceeding to the Lunar Lawn for a tented dinner that included Mrs. Post’s frequently served Salmon en Papillote. Hillwood Executive Director Kate Markert called the exhibit, “a singular tribute to a life lived artfully.” Mrs. Post’s granddaughter and Hillwood President Ellen MacNeille Charles said, “Little did you know that the reason to be here is to celebrate my birthday.” As “a way of life that is fast disappearing,” she said that her grandmother was not embarrassed about her wealth but loved to share it. Guests had a first look at previously off-limit areas such as a recently renovated fallout shelter and personal massage room. [gallery ids="101339,152103,152066,152099,152071,152094,152078,152083,152088" nav="thumbs"]

Mary Bird •

The Washington Hilton was party central at “Washington’s Black-Tie Gala for the Four-on-the-Floor Crowd” on June 8. Festively attired canines proudly escorted their humans and urged them toward the special Bark Bar courtesy of Barkley Square Gourmet Bakery and Boutique. News anchor Scott Thuman again served as Master of Ceremonies, sharing that his schedule requires 3 a.m. dog walks. WHS President and CEO Lisa LaFontaine spoke of the growth of programs for the “human-animal bond” and expressed her appreciation to Bark Ball Co-Chairs Terri Fariello and Beth Viola. Established in 1870 as the country’s only Congressionally chartered animal welfare agency, WHS provides protection, care and enrichment for some 30,000 animals each year. [gallery ids="101346,152275,152238,152271,152243,152267,152248,152253,152261" nav="thumbs"]