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music and lyrics by Jason Robert Brown,

book by Alfred Uhry, directed by Joel Greenberg

Studio 180 and Acting Up Stage Company,

Berkeley Street Theatre Upstairs, Toronto

January 3-22, 2011

Parade is a welcome reminder that there are still artists and producers who regard the musical as an art form rather than just a way to cash in on nostalgia for old rock songs or movies.  Studio 180 and Acting Up Stage Company have joined forces to present the much-anticipated Canadian premiere of Jason Robert Brown’s 1998 musical about prejudice in 1913 Atlanta and have assembled a formidable cast of singing actors to bring this complex work to life.

Based on a true story, Parade follows the arrest and prosecution of Leo Frank (Michael Therriault), a young Jewish factory manager, charged with the rape and murder of a 13-year-old female employee.  The book by Alfred Uhry shows the historical, political and social reasons why the community should turn on Frank and manipulate the evidence to find him guilty.  His arrest brings out all the tensions between North and South, Jewish and Christian, black and white, outsider and insider.  The core of the drama, however, that director Joel Greenberg rightly emphasizes, is the relation between Frank and his wife Lucille (Tracy Michailidis) that turns from cold to passionate in the midst of adversity.  Uhry’s book does, perhaps, try to cram too many angles of the story into one work, but we would like to know more about what causes the initial unhappiness between Leo and Lucille besides his contempt for the South.

The show is studded with fine performances.  Therriault gives us an intellectual and unfriendly Northerner whose actions could easily be misread.  He sings with passion and seems to channel Brent Carver, who originated the role on Broadway.  Michailidis glows with increasing radiance as she dedicates herself to clearing Leo’s name.  Jay Turvey is excellent both as a reporter who finally has “Big News” and as the governor of Georgia willing to see reason.  Mark Uhre shines as the anti-Semitic editor Tom Watson, the beauty of Uhre’s voice powerfully contrasting with the ugliness of Watson’s sentiments.  Daren A. Herbert and Alana Hibbert have a great tune at the start of Act 2 celebrating the irony of a white man being blamed for a crime for a change, and Herbert gives a chilling performance as Jim Conley, the black caretaker who knows how to play politics as well as the whites.  What resonates most are the numerous choral passages in Brown’s eclectic score that celebrate unified communal beliefs while ironically underscoring the prejudice that lies beneath the triumphalism.  

©Christopher Hoile

Note: A version of this review appeared in Eye Weekly 2011-01-04.

Photo: Michael Therriault and Tracy Michailidis. ©John Karastamatis.