‘Ragtime’ Is Inaugural Broadway Outing for Lear deBessonet as Lincoln Center Theater’s New Artistic Director

In recent years, Lear deBessonet has built a reputation for helming intuitive, imaginative, richly entertaining productions of classics ranging from Shakespeare to Sondheim. As artistic director of New York City Center’s Encores!, she guided concert productions of “Into the Woods” and “Once Upon A Mattress” that transferred to Broadway after reaping rave reviews.This fall marks Ms. deBessonet’s first season holding that title at Lincoln Center Theater, and for her inaugural Broadway outing in that capacity she has chosen another musical revival that premiered as part of Encores!: her staging of “Ragtime,” an adaptation of E.L. Doctorow’s 1975 historical novel that had its premiere at New York in 1998, with a score that put on the map the team of composer Stephen Flaherty and lyricist Lynn Ahrens, whose works also include “Once Upon This Island,” “Seussical,” and “Anastasia.”Like the novel, also the basis for a 1981 movie, the musical “Ragtime” introduces us to a socially and racially diverse array of fictional characters living in and around New York City in the early 20th century, and injects a similarly eclectic scattering of real-life figures — among them Harry Houdini, Booker T. Washington, Emma Goldman, J.P. Morgan, Henry Ford, and the showgirl Evelyn Nesbit.The focus is mostly on the made-up characters, including a prosperous white family living at New Rochelle, a Jewish immigrant named Tateh and his young daughter, and a Harlem-based black musician, Coalhouse Walker Jr., and his initially estranged sweetheart, Sarah. In the musical’s prologue, we meet the different groups they represent — first individually and then, after a few historical figures have turned up, as a mighty chorus.Joshua Henry, Caissie Levy, and Brandon Uranowitz in ‘Ragtime.’ Photo by Matthew MurphyMind you, before Ms. deBessonet brings that chorus together, she has members of each party stare at and circle each other on the vast stage, cautiously and with some obvious awkwardness. The point is clear: However sweetly these performers may harmonize, the people they play and the country they represent are still struggling to form a more perfect union.That struggle — relayed both in song and in a book by Terrence McNally, the late, long-celebrated playwright and librettist — can involve even the more privileged people we meet in “Ragtime,” like a young mother in that New Rochelle clan. Played by Caissie Levy, whose powerful voice and easy grace have served numerous Broadway productions, Mother, as she is simply identified (even by her husband), is both a devoted wife and a fiercely moral individual, and those elements come increasingly into conflict as her paths cross with other, less fortunate men and women.Tateh faces a more dire predicament, at least at first. Arriving from Latvia in search of golden opportunities, he lands instead in poverty; his plight is shared by an ensemble of overworked, underfed immigrants whose dark, dingy clothing contrasts sharply with the crisp, light-colored threads that costume designer Linda Cho has provided for these more elite ranks.Wittily and movingly played by Brandon Uranowitz, another beloved veteran of plays and musicals, Tateh eventually finds success as a version of one of the Jewish strivers who created Hollywood; but that’s only after deprivation and fear for his child’s safety drive him toward Goldman — portrayed here almost too perfectly by Shaina Taub, fresh off her stint as creator and star of the preachy suffragist musical “Suffs.”Ford and Morgan, respectively played here by Jason Forbach and John Rapson, are as slimily villainous as Goldman is stridently virtuous, with Morgan emerging as a vile bigot to boot — which left me wondering, as I often do when seeing Broadway productions of musicals that wear populist messages like badges of honor, how many of those cheering in the orchestra section held positions at banks like those Morgan founded, and other multinational corporations.Lincoln Center TheaterYet no one in “Ragtime” is subject to greater misfortune or more soul-shattering misery than Coalhouse or Sarah, played by Joshua Henry (another Broadway favorite) and Nichelle Smith, whose booming vocal performances, in solo numbers and duets, nearly stopped the show at the preview I attended.Granted, Broadway audiences tend to be suckers for over-the-top singing, and as much as I admired Mr. Henry’s and Ms. Lewis’s chops — and the genuine, undeniable passion both brought to their roles — my favorite performance was Ms. Levy’s more measured, luminous reading of “Back to Before,” an eleven o’clock number in which Mother reflects on the passive role she has assumed in marriage and yearns for more agency.Such relative introspection is, by design, rare in “Ragtime,” and Ms. deBessonet and her cast — aided by a full orchestra under James Moore’s vigorous direction — capture its musical and historical sweep. If the material here isn’t as enchanting as that in some of Ms. deBessonet’s previous outings, it’s certainly timely, and should inspire a lot of conversation after the curtain call.

‘Ragtime’ Is Inaugural Broadway Outing for Lear deBessonet as Lincoln Center Theater’s New Artistic Director

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