Katie Thompson and the Ensemble of Gun & Powder. Photo © Jeremy Daniel
I was a kid in the late 1950s and early 1960s and the western was undisputed, unchallenged King of television. No matter what channel you turned to, there was a marshal with a ten gallon hat and big, big badge shooting it out with the bad guys. There were good citizens, like the men of the Ponderosa in Bonanza, fighting evildoers every single week, Women? The most gorgeous women in the world, all in love with the good guys. No matter what channel you turned to, there was the story of truth justice and the American way – on horseback. Six gun glory.
You want more? How about the Lone Ranger and his good buddy Tonto? ("Hi Ho Silver!").
The years went by and the westerns were all chased into some big canyon and disappeared. So you can imagine my delight when the Paper Mill Playhouse, in Millburn, announced that it was reviving the old western with Gun & Powder, a new musical based on the true story of Mary and Martha Clarke and their mom, Tallulah Clarke, in 1893 Texas. The playwright, Angelica Cherie, is a descendant of the Clarkes.
Ciara Renée, Liisi LaFontaine and Hunter Parrish in Gun & Powder, photo © Jeremy Daniel
I expected to walk into the theater and see Wyatt Earp and Doc Holiday battle with all the bad guys in the gunfight at the OK Corral or at least a wild and wooly shootout in the crowded and dangerous streets of Dodge City.
No such luck. I had to keep my six gun in its holster. Gun & Powder has none of the old marshal heroism and gunfights. It is a quiet, studious look, true story, at the efforts off two twin sisters, Mary and Martha Clarke (light skinned African Americans (via their mom Tallulah’s marriage to a white man), who work hard to pay off the debts their mom incurred as a Texas sharecropper.
But no stage coach robberies, cowboys riding horses up into the hills, or main street shootouts here. Gun & Powder, written by Angelica Cheri, is a fine effort at the old days but it dies, bullet in chest, in its own Main Street shootout. There are beautiful girls running around in saloons and dance halls, but no Miss Kitty from Gunsmoke, no heroic old west marshals that’s for sure.
The play, abut black women in show business in that 1890s era in Texas, follows the careers of Mary, Martha and Tallulah Clarke and the troubles they found in a racist America. The play, written by Miss Cheri over the course of ten years, does not really go anywhere. It starts off as an effort to find a hall for a show, but does not. Then it moves on with other plots, but never really zeroes in on the woes of women in that era, whether black or white.
The music, by Ross Baum and Austin Cook, with orchestration by John Clancy, with songs by Angelika Cheri, who also wrote the book, dries up faster than the paint on the old wagons, The first few songs all sound exactly the same. The play turns out to be several plays in one. The sisters sell themselves as whites to make money to pay the family debt. From there, the musical becomes a story about black segregation in Texas, then this then that In the end you have a rather late (1893) story about the family and its struggle. Oh, there are several love stories – with men black and white – bound into all of this.
Jeannette Bayardelle in Gun & Powder, photo © Evan Zimmerman
There are good things to be said about the play. Beowulf Borrit has done a fine job with the scenery for the musical, Adam Honore’s lighting and Conner Wang’s sound are impressive (the opening scene cotton field is rather striking). The story in the play, of the Clarke sisters, takes place amid several large and impressive sets, indoor and outdoor.
Stevie Walker Webb has done fine work in directing this convoluted play. Tiffany Rea Fisher deserves much credit for the choreography of the story.
The Clarke story is one of those interesting but untold tales of the Old West. That is obvious in the story. The play enjoys really fine acting by Liisi LaFontaine, Ciara Renee, Jeanette Bayard Elle and others.
Director Walker Webb deserves much credit for trying to put all the pieces of the tale together and Austin Cook has done fine work as music director.
There is a long and involved story about a gun the sisters get, but I won’t tell you it here.
Liisi LaFontaine, Ciara Renée and Malik Shabazz Kitchen in Gun & Powder, photo © Evan Zimmerman
The play is a solid story about the west in the 1890s, but it is too long ( 2 ½ hours) and has too many characters and too many parts to its puzzle.
Playwright Cheri might have been better off with a little Wyatt Earp thrown into the story. She might have written a tighter, easier to follow story, too.
Oh well, Hi Ho Silver.
Gun & Powder is presented at Paper Mill Playhouse (22 Brookside Drive) in Millburn through May 5, 2024. Click here for more information or to purchase tickets.
Hunter Parrish and the Ensemble of Gun & Powder, photo © Jeremy Daniel
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