‘Camping with Henry and Tom’ superb

Tom Titus

There is no historical confirmation that the leader of the free

world, one of America’s captains of industry and its most renowned

inventor ever became stranded in the woods together, beyond contact

with the outside world.

It’s a matter of record, however, that President Warren G. Harding

did indeed participate in a camping trip with Henry Ford and Thomas

Edison, which prompted playwright Mark St. Germain to create “Camping

With Henry and Tom,” the latest production at the Newport Theater

Arts Center.

Given the character and personalities of the three men, St.

Germain has created a “fiction suggested by fact,” thrusting these

three historical figures together and turning them loose, so to

speak, on one another. The resulting Newport production, directed by

Phyllis Gitlin, is among the most impressive of the year in community

theater.

Such a fabrication -- involving men who left their mark, one way

or another, on American history -- demands an outstanding cast, and

Gitlin has accomplished this objective with the three actors who

share the stage and air their passions, or lack of them, in the

privacy of the forest. The three combine to render a superbly enacted

account of what might actually have transpired back in the summer of

1921.

To briefly set the stage of history, Harding was a man who never

wanted to be president and entered the history books as one of the

most ineffectual holders of that office. Ford, on the other hand,

yearned desperately to occupy the White House, a dream that was

denied him, while Edison existed in an intellectual plane far above

both and couldn’t care less who was in charge.

It is the Henry Ford character who commands most of the stage

time, and Jack Messenger delivers a powerfully arresting performance

in this role. Messenger’s Ford is a blunt, opinionated and, as it

develops, viciously bigoted man whose politics would play more

effectively in Nazi Germany. Messenger pilots his Ford into emotional

overdrive, running roughshod over the president, but deferring to the

famed inventor to the point where he can address him only as “Mr.

Edison.”

Tom Turnley, in the much lower-key character of President Harding,

readily acknowledges his failings -- including his fathering of a

child with his mistress, Nan Britton, during a Clintonesque

rendezvous in the White House. As much as Ford covets his office,

Harding would love to give it to him, or anyone else, and Turnley

beautifully renders this scandal-plagued figure with all his faults

intact.

The role of Edison, whose famed deafness seems quite selective, is

enriched with satirical irony by Jack Rule, who not only resembles

the late actor John Houseman physically, but vocally as well.

Edison’s stature at the time placed him several rungs above Ford on

the ladder of prestige, and Rule captures this kingly quality in an

excellent performance.

The play’s fourth character, a Secret Service agent who discovers

the stranded campers late in the play, is played with proper rigidity

by Andrew Vonderschmitt. His impact is slight, but telling, such as

the moment when, in deference to Harding, he refuses to be cowed by

the ballistic Ford.

The Maryland forest setting, which prevails as the captor of the

three men, is most realistically designed by Marty Eckmann, one of

the finest scenic backdrops offered in local community theater all

season. Donna Fritsche contributes fine period costumes, while Mitch

Atkins’ lighting and Ron Wyand’s sound effects serve the production

equally well.

“Camping With Henry and Tom” probably isn’t historically accurate,

but like other plays with celebrated figures of the past, it offers a

provocative glimpse at what might have transpired had these three men

been thrust together in such a situation. In any event, it’s a

terrific evening of theater.

* TOM TITUS reviews local theater for the Daily Pilot. His reviews

appear Saturdays.