Theater Review -- Tom Titus

If you think the 1960s were divisive in America, be thankful you

weren’t around for the 1860s.

The four nightmarish years that tore our nation to shreds in the midst

of the 19th century are retold with passion, poetry and a haunting

musical accompaniment in “John Brown’s Body,” a riveting production at

Orange Coast College.

From Harper’s Ferry to Fort Sumpter to Gettysburg and finally to

Appomattox, the Pulitzer Prize-winning poem by Stephen Vincent Benet --

originally arranged for the stage by the noted actor-director Charles

Laughton -- is given a dynamic reading by seven exceptional collegiate

actors, backed by a full chorus.

Director Alex Golson and Musical Director Beth Hansen have

collaborated on a moving and thought-provoking rendition of Benet’s epic

poetry and Fenno Heath’s haunting score, from which the Union Army’s

anthem sprang. Delivered much like a recital, more narrative than action,

the show nevertheless singes the heart as it presents both sides of the

terrible conflict that claimed a total of 618,000 American lives.

OCC’s seven cast members are not identified in the program with their

characters, primarily because they play so many, on both sides of the

Mason-Dixon line. This versatility, however, does not prevent their

audiences from bonding with various phases of their presentation, such as

the escaped Yankee prisoner who falls in love with a Southern farm girl,

the proud rebel plantation owner or the preening Southern society lady.

The performers, all enormously effective, are Raya Belna, Jared R.

Carns, James Grant, Lauren Jessica Kushin, James McGinnis, Christopher

Meditz and Jenelle M. Smith. Since they are not pictured in the program

(although they do identify themselves briefly before the performance),

it’s virtually impossible to link them with their characters without a

photographic memory.

They function as a smoothly interacting ensemble, much like the

chorale -- Wendy Jean Cardinal-Nix, Eileen Garcia, Anne Gray, Leslie

Holland, Leah Lyle, Katie McGuire, Rebecca Muhleman, Vanessa Nguyen,

Chanel Panagiotopoulos, Emily Rued, Jessica Teter, Pat Turner, Linda

Viramontes and Jolene Ybarra. Musical Director Hansen accompanies and

directs them with understated emotion.

Told entirely in verse, “John Brown’s Body” is a dramatic history

lesson that might be termed the flip side of the musical “1776,” which

chronicled the Revolutionary War in drama, song and occasional comedy.

Don’t expect many laughs at OCC, where the grimness of the conflict

and the commitment to the cause, on both sides, makes for some pretty

weighty viewing, particularly in light of the savagery being played out

in other parts of the world today.

Perhaps the definitive statement on the Civil War was made by Shelby

Foote, and quoted in the OCC program: “Before the war, it was said, ‘the

United States are . . .’ After the war, it was always ‘the United States

is . . .’ as we say today . . . and that sums up what the war

accomplished. It made us an ‘is.”’