[NEohioPAL]Rave Review for FIGHT AGAINST SLAVERY at Actors' Summit

Tue Jan 14 05:55:26 PST 2003

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Play puts passions of history on stage
`Fight Against Slavery' premieres in Hudson
By Kerry Clawson
Beacon Journal staff writer

Whether regarded as a terrorist zealot or a hero, abolitionist John Brown was 
right about one thing: Much blood would have to be shed before this nation 
would be purged of the crimes of slavery.

``The crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood,'' 
Brown wrote in his final note to his jailer before he was hanged in Virginia 
for treason in 1859.

That telling quote is repeated a couple of times in Neil Thackaberry's world 
premiere of The Fight Against Slavery: John Brown & Federick Douglass, which 
opened last weekend at Actors' Summit in Hudson. The play is appropriately 
staged in the town where Brown grew up on his father Owen Brown's tannery, 
later running his own tannery north of town.

Playwright and director Thackaberry, who has studied the close relationship 
between Brown and former slave Douglass through their writings for years, 
said he wanted this play to be more than a history lesson. He wanted to bring 
alive the real drama of these two men, allowing audiences to both learn 
something and enjoy themselves.
Thackaberry, who plays Brown, and his co-star Mark Gates, who plays Frederick 
Douglass, have succeeded in offering a riveting historical drama. They have 
great material to work with, considering Brown and Douglass were both 
impassioned, eloquent orators who offered rich descriptions of their 
experiences.

Using Brown's and Douglass' own letters and other writings, Thackaberry has 
created a piece of theater that flows well and tells a valuable story.

Despite these men's differences, both were figures of great importance in 
19th-century American history. Through three key confrontations, this play 
brings alive both their unlikely friendship and their deep respect for each 
other.

Thackaberry offers us a biting, single-minded Brown who won't back down. 
Gates' Douglass is the more complex character, who has the same goal of 
abolishing slavery but is much less sure about how to do so.

Brown was a man willing to die in his fight to end slavery. His whole life as 
well as the lives of his family members were devoted to this mission.
In the beginning of this story, former slave Douglass, a pacifist, is 
ideologically opposed to Brown's extremism. Brown supported any means to end 
slavery, including violence.

This play shows Douglass' evolution toward accepting violence as a way to end 
slavery. Yet Douglass couldn't join in Brown's feverish plans to form an 
armed force that would hide in the Appalachian mountains and devote itself to 
daring raids to free slaves, one plantation at a time.

Douglass' soliloquy reacting to both Brown's mountain plot and the new 
constitution he has written is both telling and slightly humorous.

Gates' finest moments include a fiery abolitionist Fourth of July speech in 
Rochester, N.Y. Here, Douglass condemns all those who celebrate freedom yet 
allow slavery to continue.

Douglass respects and is awed by Brown's heroism. He has never met a white 
man who would give up his life to end slavery.

The drama reaches its height at a secret meeting between Brown and Douglass 
at an abandoned quarry in Pennsylvania. Brown reveals his plan to capture the 
federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Va., to lead a slave uprising. This is 
where the friends split forever.

In The Fight Against Slavery, real historical events and the words of real 
men provide more drama and passion than any tale of fiction could. The years 
just before the Civil War broke out were desperate times that extremist Brown 
believed called for desperate measures.

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<HTML>Play puts passions of history on stage
 `Fight Against Slavery' premieres in Hudson
 By Kerry Clawson
 Beacon Journal staff writer
 
 Whether regarded as a terrorist zealot or a hero, abolitionist John Brown was right about one thing: Much blood would have to be shed before this nation would be purged of the crimes of slavery.
 
 ``The crimes of this guilty land will never be purged away but with blood,'' Brown wrote in his final note to his jailer before he was hanged in Virginia for treason in 1859.
 
 That telling quote is repeated a couple of times in Neil Thackaberry's world premiere of The Fight Against Slavery: John Brown & Federick Douglass, which opened last weekend at Actors' Summit in Hudson. The play is appropriately staged in the town where Brown grew up on his father Owen Brown's tannery, later running his own tannery north of town.
 
 Playwright and director Thackaberry, who has studied the close relationship between Brown and former slave Douglass through their writings for years, said he wanted this play to be more than a history lesson. He wanted to bring alive the real drama of these two men, allowing audiences to both learn something and enjoy themselves.
 Thackaberry, who plays Brown, and his co-star Mark Gates, who plays Frederick Douglass, have succeeded in offering a riveting historical drama. They have great material to work with, considering Brown and Douglass were both impassioned, eloquent orators who offered rich descriptions of their experiences.
 
 Using Brown's and Douglass' own letters and other writings, Thackaberry has created a piece of theater that flows well and tells a valuable story.
 
 Despite these men's differences, both were figures of great importance in 19th-century American history. Through three key confrontations, this play brings alive both their unlikely friendship and their deep respect for each other.
 
 Thackaberry offers us a biting, single-minded Brown who won't back down. Gates' Douglass is the more complex character, who has the same goal of abolishing slavery but is much less sure about how to do so.
 
 Brown was a man willing to die in his fight to end slavery. His whole life as well as the lives of his family members were devoted to this mission.
 In the beginning of this story, former slave Douglass, a pacifist, is ideologically opposed to Brown's extremism. Brown supported any means to end slavery, including violence.
 
 This play shows Douglass' evolution toward accepting violence as a way to end slavery. Yet Douglass couldn't join in Brown's feverish plans to form an armed force that would hide in the Appalachian mountains and devote itself to daring raids to free slaves, one plantation at a time.
 
 Douglass' soliloquy reacting to both Brown's mountain plot and the new constitution he has written is both telling and slightly humorous.
 
 Gates' finest moments include a fiery abolitionist Fourth of July speech in Rochester, N.Y. Here, Douglass condemns all those who celebrate freedom yet allow slavery to continue.
 
 Douglass respects and is awed by Brown's heroism. He has never met a white man who would give up his life to end slavery.
 
 The drama reaches its height at a secret meeting between Brown and Douglass at an abandoned quarry in Pennsylvania. Brown reveals his plan to capture the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Va., to lead a slave uprising. This is where the friends split forever.
 
 In The Fight Against Slavery, real historical events and the words of real men provide more drama and passion than any tale of fiction could. The years just before the Civil War broke out were desperate times that extremist Brown believed called for desperate measures.</HTML>

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