Lou Beatty Patriot

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  • 8/22/2019 Lou Beatty Patriot

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    Langes Lady Patriot a wonderfulsurprise

    Lauren Carroll/Journal

    Connie Ventress (from left) plays Elizabeth Van Lew, Chrystee Pharris plays Mary Bowser and Lou Beatty Jr. plays Old Robert in the

    National Black Theatre Festival's presentation of "Lady Patriot," written and directed by Ted Lange.

    Lynn Felder/Special Correspondent

    Lady Patriot, written and directed by Ted Lange, is a wonderful surprise awaiting

    audiences at the National Black Theatre Festival.

    It opened Tuesday at Hanesbrands Theatre and played Wednesday afternoon to a standing

    ovation.

    What play have you seen at the National Black Theatre Festival that you would

    recommend to other readers?

    Playwright and director Lange came onstage before the show to welcome the audience

    members and assure us that the events depicted in the show were true. The Internet backs

    him up.

    Lady Patriot is the story of Mary Bowser, a freed slave and unlikely spy in the Jefferson

    Davis White House who helped to bring down the Confederacy with her intelligence work.

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    Chrystee Pharris gives a luminous performance in the title role. Her characters ability to

    blend into the background is what gives her an advantage while gathering intelligence, but

    Pharris would only ever fade into the woodwork if she chose to. She has star-quality

    presence.

    When Pharris says with passion, Once you taste freedom, you want everybody to drinkfrom that bowl, you will want to stand and cheer. Go for it.

    Pharriss Mary is lively but subtle and especially engaging in her scenes with her mistress,

    the crazy Elizabeth Van Lew, and with her unwitting co-conspirator, Old Robert.

    Lou Beatty Jr. is marvelous as Old Robert, who seamlessly goes from being Jefferson

    Davis dutiful servant to his convivial confidante. Beattys face is perfectly expressive, one

    moment pulled down by gravity and weariness, the next lifted up and as bright as the sun. It

    wont be giving away too much to say that he has the last laugh, and it is wonderful.

    Jefferson Davis wife, Varina, played by Anne Johnstonbrowne, is the scariest character in

    the ensemble or maybe in any ensemble. An absinthe-swilling bigot, she makes Archie

    Bunker look like a liberal. Pampered and cosseted as she is, Varina has her share of

    issues, not the least of which is being that she is more or less constantly pregnant, and her

    husband is still in love with his dead first wife.

    Gordon Goodmans Jefferson Davis is a dashing monster, conniving and charming by turns.

    By the end of the war, which coincides with the end of the play, Davis is hopeless and lost,

    but his arrogance and delusion keep him going. His relationships with his Secretary of War

    Judah P. Benjamin, played by Paul Messinger, and with Old Robert are some of the most

    interesting in the show. He has sold off Old Roberts beloved wife and children, and he stillhas the gall to ask the freedman to take care of Varina and the Davis children when he

    retreats from Richmond.

    Benjamin, a Jew, is as devoted to the South as Davis is, but he at least knows when the

    cause is lost. Messingers Benjamin is somewhat sympathetic, a survivor in a sea of

    intolerance.

    Connie Ventress is convincing as the crazy-like-a-fox Elizabeth. She is seductive with

    Slydell, the journalist played by Robert Pine, motherly in her scenes with Pharris, and dotty

    in her scenes with Johnstonbrowne.

    Pine and Johnstonbrowne have a devastating scene toward the end of the show. Varina is

    under house arrest as a traitor in Savannah, and Slydell is interviewing her for the New York

    Tribune.

    Pine is appealing on stage, and he gets to make a powerful speech that summarizes the

    plays main themes. At a high point, Slydell tells the absinthe-addled Varina, Whether you

    like it or not, America is changing. Whether you like it or not, America is becoming a

    stronger nation. a nation with liberty and justice for ALL.