Chris Giese
Leigh Ann Larkin as Violet and Kevin McAllister as Flick.
Violet is looking for a miracle. Scarred by a horrific accident, she had gone to doctors, snake handlers and organized religion looking for someone to erase the damage that was done to her face and her spirit. Finally, Violet decides to embark on a cross-country bus trip to find a televangelist she believes can set her free.
With a uniformly impressive cast, a genius set and many heartfelt performances, Capital City Theatre launched a solid inaugural production, Violet, in Music Hall on the UW Madison campus.
Based on the short story “The Ugliest Pilgrim,” by Doris Betts, Violet began as a one-act, evolved into the small-scale musical that opened off Broadway in 1997 and then earned praise on Broadway in 2014 as a vehicle for Sutton Foster. With a book by Brian Crawley and music by Jeanine Tesori (the much-celebrated composer of Fun Home, Caroline or Change, Shrek the Musical and Thoroughly Modern Millie), the show features a mix of gospel, blues and country tunes that chronicle Violet’s journey from the mountains of Spruce Pine, N.C., to Tulsa, Okla., in search of her miracle makeover.
As the physically scarred and emotionally damaged Violet, an earnest Leigh Ann Larkin immediately draws the audience in. Her clear, haunting singing voice is as straightforward as her character. Although we cannot see the disfiguring scar on her face, we can clearly see the toll it has taken — Larkin’s entire body is weighed down with her pain and her longing for acceptance.
Equally stunning is Violet’s younger self, played with exceptional poise by local high school student Olivia de Waart. In flashback scenes, she matches Larkin both vocally and physically to an uncanny degree, providing insight on Violet’s aching loss of her mother, her difficult relationship with her father and her complicated interactions with men, who cannot see past her hideous scar.
Local performer Jace Nichols revels in the two best supporting roles in the show. As Violet’s father, he is a physically powerful, simple man who is ill-equipped to raise his daughter after the death of his wife and is wracked with guilt about the accident that traumatized his beautiful girl. As the preacher, whose heartfelt ministry has turned into a televised parody of love and faith, Nichols nails the manic, tent revival-style healer who speaks in tongues and cures the sick — as long as the cameras are rolling. His scenes with Violet when the curtain has been pulled away are understated and moving, particularly when he refuses to minister to her, saying, “there’s nothing really wrong with you.”
Chris Giese
Corey Mach, Nicole Michelle Haskins and Leigh Ann Larkin (left to right) in Capital City Theatre's debut performance of "Violet."
For a woman who claims to repel every man, woman and child she meets, it’s somewhat surprising that Violet finds herself in an awkward love triangle with two soldiers she meets on the bus. Monty (Corey Mach) is an outgoing Green Beret who, after a drunken one-night stand, claims to love Violet in spite of her looks. The other is Flick (Kevin McAllister), a sensitive African American army sergeant who is used to being judged on his appearance. Over the course of the story, he falls in love with the true Violet; the person she is underneath. McAllister not only portrays Flick with humor and clear-eyed affection, he also pours himself into every song, his gorgeous, resonant voice filling the theater.
Kudos also to the tragically underused Kimberly JaJuan, who completely embodies her tiny roles throughout the play, and then explodes in the rousing gospel number, “Raise Me Up.”
The set, designed by Keith Pitts, is both deceptively simple and versatile. A roadside billboard displaying the map of Violet’s journey is augmented with a weathered wooden platform and a few other pieces to portray a bus terminal, a Memphis dance club and the preacher’s television studio. Three doors in the map are used to great effect, along with dramatic lighting by Cory Pattak.
Unfortunately, with all of these spectacular elements in place, Violet still disappoints on a structural level. The story is thin and somewhat repetitive, and the ending obvious and anticlimactic. There are many bright spots in the production, but there are as many lulls. In conceiving the musical, the inherent challenge was how to make a long, dull bus ride dramatic. In the end, there is not enough momentum to propel the show forward at a satisfying pace, no matter how invested we are in the characters.
That said, with this production, Capital City Theatre has indeed entered the Madison arts community embracing its mission: presenting cutting-edge works, employing top national and local talent and grooming young, future stars. Based on the warm welcome the company received on opening night, local audiences will look forward to seeing more productions from the company in the future.
