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Parade Music and lyrics by Jason Robert Brown Book by Alfred Uhry at the Vivian Beaumont Theater Harold Prince has made a career of producing and directing serious, socially conscious musicals. So it should come as no surprise that Parade, concerning the events surrounding the Georgia arrest, trial, and lynching of pencil factory superintendent Leo Frank for the murder of 13-year-old Mary Phagan, would supply ideal material for Prince. Abetted by Patricia Birch's finest choreography in years and the handsome work of set designer Riccardo Hernandez (Bring In 'Da Noise, Bring In 'Da Funk), Prince has given the Lincoln Center Theater production an exquisite, cinematic, superbly fluid and focused staging. Librettist Alfred Uhry has already mined his Southern Jewish background to memorable effect in Driving Miss Daisy and The Last Night of Ballyhoo; here drawing on a stark historic incident from his heritage, Uhry supplies scenes that are pungent, economic in their detail yet always vivid. Prince and Uhry were naturals for Parade, so perhaps the biggest news here is that the show introduces to Broadway a young composer-lyricist, Jason Robert Brown, whose work is fascinating, complex, and unfailingly theatrical. Boasting two terrific lead performances, Parade is a somber, gripping beauty of a show, the kind musical theater fans will relish and wish to see more than once. While it is by no means through-sung, it plays like nothing so much as a lovely new American opera. Because Parade is ambitious and sets the story of its two central characters against a larger social canvas, it has a structural situation that may require patience on first viewing; while this doesn't prevent the show from being immensely impressive, it does call for some explaining. The emotional heart of the show, what we come to care about most, is the relationship between Leo and wife Lucille: As Lucille fights for justice for her husband, she changes from a docile Southern belle to a figure of strength. And an arranged, somewhat distant and sterile marriage is transformed, husband and wife falling in love for the first time as a result of what they have endured in the two years following Mary's murder. In addition to telling the story of the Franks, Prince (who is the show's co-conceiver) and the authors have chosen to offer a panoramic depiction of the social climate and the backstage political maneuvering that allowed such things to occur. In order to accomplish this, many characters (prosecutor, defense lawyer, governor, newspaper editor, judge, nightwatchman, janitor) figure significantly in the action and are musicalized. The final 25 minutes of the first act (including nine numbers) are devoted to the trial; the sequence is dazzling but time consuming, as is Mary's funeral. Then there is reporter Britt Craig (Evan Pappas), who seizes upon the trial as a career-maker but who becomes emotionally drawn into it; Craig functions as both a principal character and narrator/ commentator. Because the writing is consistently intelligent and the score always intriguing, none of this feels extraneous, and we're held and carried along swiftly. But it does of necessity take time away from Leo and Lucille. They are nicely delineated in song and speech at the beginning: Brooklyn Jew Leo's feelings of being an outsider in Marietta ("How Can I Call This Home?"), and the comfortable but unfulfilled marriage ("Leo at Work/What Am I Waiting For?") are aptly musicalized. Lucille has a powerful number when, just before the trial, she silences reporter Craig with "You Don't Know This Man." In Act Two, as Lucille takes her cause to Governor Slaton, then husband and wife gain hope in the duet "This Is Not Over Yet" and share a beautiful final song, "All the Wasted Time," we reach the emotional center of the show. On first viewing, I felt we needed more time with this couple earlier, or that Lucille's transformation might have been introduced in the first half; on second, I felt just about everything was necessary and that little could have been cut away without diminishing the richness of the piece. For if Parade is almost overloaded with plot and characters, it is an understated knockout, and for that credit must go above all to Prince's masterful direction (watch him pull an Evita-like shift in perspective during the trial), and to Brown, whose work here is wildly accomplished and original but may require more than one hearing for full appreciation. Parade takes as one of its central themes how the South's loss of the Civil War made Frank's cause hopeless from the start, and it's appropriately established by the use of Confederate Memorial Day parades which frame the show: In the stirring opening number "The Old Red Hills of Home," a young Confederate soldier bids farewell to the home he's going off to fight for, only to be replaced by his image (short a leg) 50 years later, as the 1913 parade (the day of Mary's murder) kicks off. When unscrupulous sweeper Jim Conley is confronted late in the evening for further questioning, there's a chain-gang sequence which makes excellent use of gospel chant interspersed with dialogue. All of the trial pieces are arresting: The hypnotic chant of the factory girls; Conley's rhythmically powerful "That's What He Said"; and the shocking peak of the evening, "Come Up to My Office," a fantasy of Frank offering his factory girls the respite of some hot afternoon fun. The latter number features traces of "The Picture Show," an arresting early song for Mary's young admirer. There's the irony-laden "A Rumblin' and a Rollin," in which four blacks offer their perspective on the events of the trial. Governor Slaton's carefree "Pretty Music" offers contrast to Lucille's plea for help. And Lucille's "Do It Alone" and Leo's final statement at the trial are also fine items. With a sound sometimes reminiscent of Marc Blitzstein, few "buttons" for applause, and almost continuous musical pieces, Brown's score indicates that Broadway has found a gifted new talent. Parade is extremely fortunate to have as its leading man an inspired performer like Brent Carver, who can hold you with, and put a unique spin on, the simplest utterances. He's careful not to make Leo more likable than he actually was, and, just as in Kiss of the Spider Woman, he breathes musical numbers with an intensity that possesses his whole being. Carolee Carmello has never before been shown to such advantage; the model of genteel Southern womanhood at the beginning, her Lucille is a different, triumphantly touching figure by the final blackout. A very strong singer as well, Carmello is quite wonderful here. Among the sterling ensemble, registering most strongly are Rufus Bonds, Jr. (Conley), Kirk McDonald (Mary's admirer), John Hickok (Slaton), and Ray Aranha (night watchman Newt Lee). With a dominating, foreboding oak tree upstage throughout, this is a sleek production all around, from Judith Dolan's subtle costuming and Howell Binkley's atmospheric lighting, to the ideal orchestrations by Don Sebesky and Brown. Because Parade is a solemn, sometimes grim show about a horrific event, the kind of thing perhaps not destined to be an enormous crowd pleaser or blockbuster, it's ideal for Lincoln Center, away from the pressures of sustaining a lengthy run on commercial Broadway. It should also be noted that the show was essentially produced by Garth Drabinsky for Livent prior to Lincoln Center's involvement, and is very much a part of the musical trilogy about race, class, and social relations in the U.S. that was begun with Show Boat and continued in Ragtime. The final stage chapter in this trilogy about a far-from-concluded American saga makes for a haunting, memorable new musical. By Ken Mandelbaum
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