[NEohioPAL] Great Reviews of MARK TWAIN & UNFORGETTABLE at Actors' Summit! In Rep Now

[Neil Thackaberry]

Actors’ Summit’s ‘Unforgettable’ has memorable moments

*6/25/2009 - West Side Leader
**By Roger Durbin*

HUDSON — Actors’ Summit Theater’s production of “Unforgettable” neatly ties
major moments in the life of memorable singer Nat “King” Cole with the tunes
that made him famous.



The one-man play starring Reginald Scott will be shown through July 26 as
part of the theater’s “American Mirrors” repertory of four different shows
staged in the company’s theater and at the Hudson Library.



What’s interesting about this production is that it matters not whether you
know who Nat “King” Cole is. If you do, the music will be nostalgic,
transporting you back to what seems like an easier time. If you don’t, you
get to learn some wonderful songs and about the man who sang them into the
canon of American music standards.



Cole’s hits (like “When I Fall in Love,” “Mona Lisa,” “For Sentimental
Reasons” and “Straighten up and Fly Right,” among other songs) are there, to
be sure, and can be enjoyed through the vocal styling of Scott. His voice is
reminiscent enough of Cole’s — a deep baritone with a light, almost airy
upper range, smooth and silky and filled with nice guy sonority — so that
the knowledgeable will recognize the connection to the master and the
neophytes will get a solid sense of the appeal of the iconic Cole.



All the tunes are made more remarkable through Actors’ Summit’s Artistic
Director Neil Thackaberry’s script. He weaves the songs into specific
incidents in the artist’s life, and in doing so, makes the lyrics and
emotional tenor of the works take on significance. At one point, Scott as
Cole talks about meeting a dancer, Nadine Robinson, who worked at one of the
clubs he was singing and playing piano at as a teenager. Scott described the
undeniable impact the young woman and her beauty had on him and then
launched into “When I Fall in Love.” One can’t help but think that Cole
probably had her in mind every time he crooned the song.



Some of the facts in Cole’s life — the big ones that ensure he’ll always be
unforgettable and the ones that most people know — come out in the play.
Cole was the first black man to have his own radio show, and in 1957, the
first TV show hosted by a black man. Those are major incidents not only in
Cole’s life but American musical and social history.



What audience members might not know is that, in the same year as his TV
debut, Cole was physically attacked and beaten — on stage — in Birmingham,
Ala., by members of the “Invisible Empire” (The Ku Klux Klan). Ironically,
and thankfully, the event backfired on the attackers. Cole became more
famous — Frank Sinatra himself intervened and paid for the singer to get out
of there — and audience members gave him a standing ovation when he came
back on stage to let them know he was battered but all right.



The juxtaposition of good and bad times in Cole’s life, of racial tensions
in segregated America and the rise of talented black artists, and the
backstage view of jazz and popular music history give shape and color to
this production. The panoply of Cole’s life gets a certain vividness that
makes this production well worth taking in.



Tickets are available by calling (330) 342-8000 or online at *
www.actorssummit.org* <http://www.actorssummit.org/>.

*Roger Durbin is professor emeritus of bibliography at The University of
Akron and an avid theater-goer. To contact him, e-mail **
r.durbin at sbcglobal.net* <r.durbin at sbcglobal.net>*.*






**
*For Actors’ Summit, never the ‘Twain’ shall meet*

* *

Bob Abelman

News-Herald, Chagrin Valley Times, Solon Times, Geauga Times Courier

Member, International Association of Theatre Critics



This review appeared in the Times papers 6/25/09



Mark Twain is one of the most quoted humorists in American history.  His
brash optimism and common-sense observations about the human condition, as
expressed through his many newspaper stories, travelogues, essays, novels,
and speeches during the late-1800s, have provided a treasure trove of clever
quips, entertaining anecdotes, and sage counsel.



Twain himself was a master storyteller with a mischievous, laid-back
Missourian manner and trademark appearance.  It is little wonder that he and
his work have become the subjects of numerous one-man shows created by
actors and literary historians.



The gold standard for these shows, Mark Twain Tonight, features award
winning actor and Cleveland native Hal Holbrook.  Mr. Holbrook has been
playing Mark Twain for 55 years, which is nearly as long as Mark Twain
played Mark Twain.  He has performed his one-man show on tour and on the
Broadway stage over 2100 times, including a short stint at PlayhouseSquare
this past March.



Close on his heels is Ashland University theater professor Ric Goodwin, who
has been performing as Twain for 28 years.  His 90-minute, one-act one-man
show, Mark Twain: Semi-literate Lecturer, Liar & Loafer, is currently being
staged by Actors’ Summit in Hudson as part of its “American Mirrors” summer
repertory festival.



The festival brings four small shows — three of which are one-man portraits
of American cultural icons, including Twain, Nat “King” Cole and Clarence
Darrow — to the Actors’ Summit stage and the Hudson Library.



The show that Mr. Goodwin has developed and performs is a compilation of
material that comes primarily from Twain’s “Life on the Mississippi,”
“Roughing It,” “Innocents Abroad” and “A Tramp Aboard,” which are
travelogues.  As such, it is a very different animal than Mr. Holbrook’s
work, which consists largely of excerpts from more humorous and profound
essays including “The Damned Human Race.”



The travelogues that dominate Mark Twain: Semi-literate Lecturer, Liar &
Loafer take us on the many journeys that constituted Mark Twain’s colorful
life, but fall short on giving much insight into Twain’s life or Twain
himself.  Missing from these selected stories is material that brings his
acerbic, back-handed wit to the forefront.  Missing is his infamous
honey-dipped political incorrectness.  Missing is an explanation for the
title of this show.



The most apparent omission is the lack of connective tissue to provide
smooth transitions from one story to the next and which tie all these
stories together.  The playbill notes that “Persons attempting to find a
motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a
moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will
be shot.”  This quote from “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” was Twain’s
attempt to sidestep the controversial nature of his book by calling
attention to its playfulness.  Unfortunately, a one-man show format demands
the very qualities this quote denounces.



Playfulness is also missing from this show.  Mr. Goodwin is a fine Twain.  He
certainly looks and sounds the part in his ivory-colored three piece suit,
thick hairpiece, moustache and southern drawl, and he has obviously mastered
the material.  What he lacks is the charm and mischievousness that so
clearly seeps from Twain’s words and permeates Mr. Holbrook’s famed
performances.



Mr. Holbrook’s one-man show is a joyous celebration of the man and his
musings.  Mr. Goodwin’s is not and, in this regard, never the Twain shall
meet.


Mark Twain: Semi-literate Lecturer, Liar & Loafer is an interesting and
informative performance piece.  It is just not as entertaining as its
namesake should inspire.  It plays in repertory until
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