Two Supreme Court Tempests Revisited on Stage

Should you be old enough to remember the Senate hearings of 1991 where Professor Anita Hill accused then-Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas, her former supervisor, of sexual harassment, you may have had a sense of déjà vu eight years ago, when Christine Blasey Ford, another accomplished academic, testified that Brett Kavanaugh, up for the same gig at that time, had assaulted her at a party back when they were teenagers.But in fact, the episodes could be distinguished due to a number of factors, not least of all timing. Justice Kavanaugh’s trial unfolded less than two years into President Trump’s first term and at the peak of the #MeToo movement, and while it would be unfair to presume to know Dr. Ford’s experience or her motives, anyone who had even a casual relationship with social media could argue that many of her supporters — and yes, some critics — were, if not driven entirely by politics, certainly influenced by them.Professor Hill, in contrast, faced a country that was at once less polarized and not as enlightened. She described a lengthy period of abuse that might have in 2018, and arguably today, seen the alleged abuser promptly canceled; instead, she wound up facing further indignities such as 1993’s “The Real Anita Hill,” in which author David Brock, then a right-leaning reporter, dismissed her as “a little bit nutty and a little bit slutty.” (Mr. Brock later became a left-leaning consultant and disavowed the book.) None of this context is provided in “The Ford/Hill Project,” drawn from the transcripts of the hearings that eventually confirmed Justices Thomas and Kavanaugh. To the contrary, the one-act piece, which premiered in 2024 and is now being presented at BAM Fisher in Brooklyn, represents the key players and their real-life dramas in interwoven fashion.Celebrated stage and screen actress Elizabeth Marvel — who created “Ford/Hill” with director Lee Sunday Heavens — and rising star Gabby Beans respectively play Dr. Ford and Professor Hill, among other characters, including various senators during certain parts of the play, which runs under 70 minutes. Teagle F. Bougere and Josh Hamilton are cast as Justices Thomas and Kavanaugh, and as senators at other points.The four performers enter while adjusting in-ear monitors that feed them edited clips from the actual hearings; the audience initially hears some of this audio to establish this process. Dr. Ford’s and Professor Hill’s opening statements are featured early on. Not long after that, the women stand side by side, each offering a few sentences before yielding to the other, as if to emphasize that their harrowing accounts are, if not interchangeable, rooted in the same enduring evil.Teagle F. Bougere and Gabby Beans in ‘The Ford/ Hill Project.’ Rebecca SmeyneThe actresses do capture, impressively, how differently the women manifested their understandable anxiety. Ms. Beans is a study in natural dignity and more practiced composure, echoing Professor Hill’s distinctly firm and resonant speaking voice, while Ms. Marvel projects more of a patently nervous energy.Messrs. Bougere and Hamilton pose an even greater disparity, so that Justice Thomas comes across as relatively unshakeable, a smooth operator, while Justice Kavanaugh’s testimony is sampled and portrayed in a way that makes him seem like an arrogant buffoon. A good chunk of the latter concerns the subject’s consumption of alcohol, which did not, to be sure, produce his best moments. Still, when members of the audience at a recent performance started laughing at him, I couldn’t help but wonder if they would be as tickled by a more liberal candidate being depicted before the nation as a mean, violent drunk.Gender roles and assumptions come into play, obviously, as the male and female cast members juggle different characters; so does race, a factor that made Justice Thomas’s hearings even more fraught. When Mr. Bougere coolly quotes his famous comparison of his ordeal to “a high-tech lynching,” it’s a reminder of the pressures that faced Professor Hill in confronting the man who would become only the second black Supreme Court justice.Of course, exactly what happened during Anita Hill’s time working for Clarence Thomas is, like whatever transpired between Brett Kavanaugh and Christine Blasey Ford when they were in high school, known only to them, and perhaps a handful of others. In more or less casting them as heroines and monsters, “The Ford/Hill Project” seemingly aims to put forth a feminist message, but whatever encouragement or insights it offers as such were lost on this woman, at least.

Two Supreme Court Tempests Revisited on Stage

Two Supreme Court Tempests Revisited on Stage

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