Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill
by Lanie Robertson
Directed by Jeffrey Nickelson
Black Theatre Troupe
The Herberger Theater Center Stage West, Phoenix
(602) 252-8497 x 3
December 26th, 2003 - January 11th, 2004
$24.00 - $30.00

As a rule, I generally loathe both one-person shows and musical revues precisely for the same reason: They tend to lack drama. Solo scripts tend either to be masturbatory or filled with historical reminiscence best served by a biography while musical revues are usually better left to CD box sets. However, there are those rare times when a one-person musical revue such as Black Theatre Troupe’s Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill that these conventions are at their very best. Lanie Robertson’s script does what most others do not: Show, don’t tell. And it’s for that reason that this production is one of the best of this genre I’ve ever seen, and well served by director Jeffrey Nickelson and its multi-talented star, Joan Pringle.

There’s a lot that Robertson exposes about Billie Holiday’s life in this seedy setting, a victim of bad choices and a cruel society. A few months later in 1959, not yet 45 years old, she will die alone under arrest in a guarded hospital room. But on this night at her drinking buddy’s bar in Philadelphia, demonized by heroine, alcoholism, and the good love she never found, the playwright allows her to transcend mere chanteuse to become the living embodiment of a blues song, piecing together through song and personal recollections a shattered artist who sings to live and escape from her life outside of her music. However, this is not a normal set from a star at the end of her career. There are three types of drama: Man against Nature, Man against Man, and Man against Himself. This script is an excellent illustration of the latter: The dramatic battle that rages in Holiday’s beleaguered mind makes for an engrossingly theatrical ninety minutes.

Technically, this isn’t a one-person show. Pringle’s Holiday shares the stage with supportive and enabling bar owner Hal Emerson (Kwane Vedrene) and a trio of excellent musicians to back her up (John Summers’ piano, Ray Carter’s bass, and Sherman Martin-Austin on the drums), but this is Lady Day’s evening. The band is in great form, Vedrene is a strong, mostly silent presence, and Summers is appropriately hesitant when asked to make excuses for the temperamental Holiday, but it is undoubtedly Pringle who carries the show. Nickelson has wisely avoided turning Pringle into an impersonator. Pringle’s singing is her own, with just the right amount of hints at Holiday. For example, she incorporates Holiday’s trademark trilling at the end of songs without mimicking them, an excellent choice. Pringle easily embodies Holiday’s course and abrupt personality that is at times hilarious and unnerving. Her slow fall into drunkenness and bitterness is carefully achieved without any true notice given to its descent. By the end of the evening, the audience feels as though they have witnessed a set by the legendary jazz and blues singer, enjoying renditions of her great hits like “God Bless the Child,” “Strange Fruit,” and “When a Woman Loves a Man,” while also being a part of a journey through her hard life. Nickelson and Pringle bring us as close to living the blues as you can get without your needing a trip to the analyst.

C.C. Jones’ musical direction is excellent, bringing to life the elements of the setting. Thom Gilseth’s representation of a smoky bar is successful, as are Michael J. Eddy’s variations of lighting. Linda A. Benson’s costumes are all exactly character-specific, while Brian Burrill’s sound design is flawless.

It’s the tail end of the holiday season, and by now you’ve probably overdosed on joy and cheer. For an excellent counterbalance of drama and blues, this is an emotionally draining but completely worthwhile show.