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Review: ‘Caroline, or Change’

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By Jeanne Claire van Ryzin | Tuesday, September 30, 2008, 11:14 AM

Complex and thought-provoking, Tony Kushner’s “Caroline, or Change” — a sung-through musical set in Civil Rights-era Louisiana — gets a compelling and impeccable production from Zach Theatre.

More a modern chamber opera than a song-and-dance musical theater spectacle, “Caroline” doesn’t deal with the topics typically found in Broadway musicals (the show won a Tony Award for Best Actress during its Broadway run) — nor are there witty rhymes, dance extravaganzas and serendipitous plot turns. And that makes ‘Caroline’ an utterly refreshing modern musical — and utterly relevant theater.

And thanks to some stellar vocal performances as well as director Dave Steakley’s smart choice to leave well enough alone, Kushner’s story crackles with intelligence and pokes the conscience with its prescient thoughtfulness. ‘Caroline’ is a high-water mark of the fall theater season.

On the personal level, ‘Caroline’ is about a stoic and skeptical black housekeeper (Janis Stinson) working for a Jewish family, the Gellmans, in Lake Charles, La., and her close relationship with the family’s 8-year-old boy Noah (Matthew Moore) who has recently lost his mother and gained a stepmother, Rose (Meredith McCall). On the public level, the story is about the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and the swirling rise of the Civil Rights movement.

(Kushner, who won the Pulitzer for his epic two-part seven-hour “Angels in America,” was raised in Lake Charles in the 1960s. Zach Theatre produced “Angels” in 1998 and 1999.)

The “change” in Kushner’s title is cleverly two-fold. Young Noah has the bad habit of leaving spare change in his pants pocket which Caroline dutifully collects and puts in a cup to return to him. Meanwhile, outside the Gellman’s laundry room, powerful change shakes the country as the Civil Rights Movement gains momentum and pre-existing social, racial and political mores are threatened with implosion.

Armed with her well-intentioned New York liberalism, Noah’s stepmother tries to have an effect on her new life in the South and decides to teach Noah a lesson and tells Caroline to keep any change she finds. Caroline doesn’t know how to feel about this new-fangled form of charity, but she needs the money for her own children. And it doesn’t get any easier when Caroline finds a $20 bill in Noah’s pocket.

As a backdrop to this all too real situation, Kushner imagines a surreal cast of secondary characters. There’s a 1960s girl group trio that represents the radio that is Caroline’s laundry room companion, the washing machine (a powerful Sarah Yvonne Jones) and the dryer (Frank Viveros) pop up to give voice as witness to Caroline’s grinding daily routine. Even the bus (Viveros again with his strong and vivid voice) Caroline takes home becomes a voice in the chorus — and the messenger who tells of Kennedy’s assassination.

Applause is due to the young and clear-voiced Matthew Moore who plays Noah with a convincing anxiousness and no stagey cuteness.

A much-celebrated veteran of Zach productions, Stinson enthralls as the enigmatic and conflicted Caroline and thoroughly captivates vocally with her rich voice.

The score, by Jeanine Tesori, blends everything from Motown to gospel to Jewish klezmer music together in an rollicking swirl with rapid shifts in mood and tone and was deftly handled by the six piece band led by Jason Connor.

Michael Raiford’s colorful rolling sets hinted nicely of place and time without overwhelming this fairly fast-paced storyline and struck a good balance between the play’s mix of realism and surrealism.

A surprise and a stand-out who veritably stole the show was Shavanna Calder as Emmie, Caroline’s strong-willed daughter. Calder is full of spark and full of lush nuanced singing.

There’s no easy resolutions in Kushner’s story — no denouements, no character or situation that clearly goes through a major change. But isn’t that the course of true change? It’s not in big sweeps, but in tiny increments.

Janis Stinson and Shavanna Calder.

‘Caroline, or Change’ continues 8 p.m. Wednesdays-Saturdays, 2:30 p.m. Sundays through Nov. 9. Zach Theatre, Kleberg Stage, W. Riverside Dr. and S. Lamar Blvd. $32-$48 ($20 on Wednesdays). www.zachtheatre.org.

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