BWW Reviews: THE CIVIL WAR at Clarksville's Roxy Regional Theatre

Like Rodney Dangerfield before him, Frank Wildhorn gets no respect in musical theater circles. Despite the relative success of his first widely known work for musical theater - Jekyll and Hyde, a popular if not exactly critical success - Wildhorn's subsequent musicals have been met with lukewarm praise, at best, including his just-closed Wonderland, which got some of the season's most scathing reviews on Broadway. The Roxy Regional Theatre, never a company to let reviews influence their show selection, brings Wildhorn's Tony Award-nominated The Civil War to the stage in Clarksville, in a largely successful and watchable production featuring a young, committed and capable cast.

Directed and choreographed with his usual competent and focused style by the Roxy's Tom Thayer, The Civil War is brought to life by a 13-member ensemble who portray "everyman" (and "everywoman," for that matter) to be found in mid-19^th Century America in order to show the impact of the conflict on the general population. However, with the wealth of material available to cast light upon the war's ravages upon the people and with Wildhorn's way with a power ballad, you would expect The Civil War to be more successful as a book musical than it actually is. Wildhorn and his collaborators - Gregory Boyd and Jack Murphy - instead have crafted what amounts to a musical revue with scarce connecting threads to join the project's various pieces together in an easy-to-follow narrative.

The heady atmosphere associated with the war's beginnings is effectively captured in the initial scenes, while throughout the work  "The Peculiar Institution" of slavery is given consideration, and the eventual  and intervening sense of doom that pervaded the South in the war's latter days are among the recurring themes found in the work. But in order to deal with all these divergent issues that, in real time, took decades to come to a head, the creators of the musical theater piece have chosen an economic, if rather perfunctory, approach.

Each of the actors in Thayer's talented ensemble portray different characters, although some repeat at various times throughout the show, and so that through-line that draws you into the story can be confusing (if I had a dollar for every time I glanced at my program for hints as to who was whom, I'd have an extra 20 bucks in my pocket, at least). Luckily, most of the boys in gray remain steadfastly gray, as do their blue-clad counterparts. Originally, the show featured a more traditional script with actors playing particular characters.

My biggest point of contention in regard to the musical's book, however, is its timeline. In the show's penultimate number, Ryan Bowie (playing a Southern officer) sings the lovely "Last Waltz for Dixie," as he exhorts his soldiers to fight on and "to do the undoable on the eve of Gettysburg," as the program informs you. Bowie's performance of the song is extraordinary, in keeping with his immense talents, and the song is moving and sweetly sentimental. But it's followed by "The Glory," "a closing anthem in which both armies state their cases for waging this bloody ward to the bitter end."

Frankly, I am still uncertain if that final tableau represents the end of the battle of Gettysburg or the end of the war, itself; if it's the end of the war, Wildhorn and company have quickly skimmed over the last two years of the conflict, giving short shrift to history. And while I agree that Gettysburg was a turning point in the war - if not the turning point - tell the people in Georgia and South Carolina that it effectively ended the war and chances are you'll find yourself embroiled in another civil war of your own. It is vague historical generalities like these that undermines the efforts of the creative team to present a believable and affecting musical accounting of this uniquely American "disagreement."

My concerns notwithstanding, what most people walk away with after seeing The Civil War is an equally vague recollection of the show's musical numbers, most of which are power ballads or ersatz country music tunes. The songs that fare best with the audience are the big ensemble numbers that are rousing and somehow gospel-tinged ("If Prayin' Were Horses," for example, performed fervently and movingly by Michael Quinichett and Jesaira Glover, "Someday," sung by Glover and Roslyn Seale, or the company's performance of "River Jordan") or martial in spirit and tone ("By the Sword/Sons of Dixie," "How Many Devils," or the aforementioned "The Glory.").

But the songs that are truly the most effective are the simpler numbers that relate the horrors of war so moving and significantly, including the lovely "Tell My Father," performed with torturEd Grace by Matthew Magnusson; Christopher Wren's sentimental performance of "Sarah," in which Union solder Sullivan Ballou (of Ken Burns' The Civil War fame) pledges undying love to his beloved wife;  and "I'll Never Pass This Way Again," which is beautifully sung and acted by Keith Panzarella.

Among other cast members, Rendell DeBose (so delightful in this season's Ain't Misbehavin') gives a stirring portrayal of Frederick Douglass, and kudos to Bryan Benware (his show opening "My Brother" is notable), Brianna Hertzberg, Travis Kendrick, Jabriel Shelton and Kendall Anne Thompson for their estimable contributions to the cause.

Thayer's keen eye for visuals ensures that The Civil War is given an inventive and creative staging - the set is beautiful, but its design is uncredited in the program - and Adam Kurtz's superb projections (photographs, letters, images from the war itself) give the production the much-needed heft of history to give perspective amid the war's sesquicentennial.

• The Civil War. Book by Frank Wildhorn, Gregory Boyd and Jack Murphy. Music by Frank Wildhorn. Lyrics by Frank Wildhorn, Gregory Boyd and Jack Murphy. Directed and choreographed by Tom Thayer. Presented by The Roxy Regional Theatre, Clarksville, through May 21. For details, visit the company website at www.roxyregionaltheatre.org. For reservations, call (931) 645-7699.

 Pictured (from top) Brianna Hertzberg, Matthew Magnusson and Ryan Bowie.

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