“Tell me a story.”
That line is repeated by cast members in the prologue to Alabama Story, a play about a book for children 3 to 7. Set in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1959, the book is The Rabbits’ Wedding, a story about a white rabbit and a black rabbit who decide they want to be forever friends and be married. Given that time and place, you may already be guessing what the play is really about.
Alabama Story, written by Kenneth Jones in 2015, is being staged by Ghostlight Ensemble, a company that specializes in site-specific plays. Ghostlight is observing Banned Books Week by presenting this story about a book in two different bookstores. (Location details below.)
Holly Robison directs the cast of six talented actors in this fact-based story of book-banning 65 years ago. Scott Olson portrays Garth Williams, author and illustrator of The Rabbits’ Wedding, which he introduces by telling us, “This is the story of two rabbits. Two rabbits who hopped out of a children's picture book and into the hot, bright light of the real world. A world so unbelievable that you could only call it...The Deep South.”
Emily Wheelock Reid (Maria Burnham) is the Alabama state librarian in 1959; she’s a calm and logical professional with wide experience in several states and she’s focused on ensuring that local libraries offer good books for the children of Alabama to read.
The firestorm erupts when a conservative (meaning racist/segregationist) newspaper in Montgomery publishes an article about a children’s book described as promoting racial integration. Emily’s associate, Thomas Franklin (Justin Broom), brings the article to her attention. Emily thinks the matter will go away, but Thomas, a local man from a conservative family, suspects it will turn into a bigger story. And it does, when a segregationist official, Senator E.W. Higgins (Tom Goodwin), introduces the book and what he views as its political theme of “integrationism” at a library committee meeting. Since it’s budget-approval time for the state library, the committee meeting signals the beginning of the war against two rabbits—and against the state librarian.
Interwoven with the furor over the book is the story of two young people who were childhood friends and meet again as adults. Lily (Haley Basil) is a white woman of privilege and Joshua (Khnemu Menu-Ra) is a Black man from a poor family who now has a corporate job in Detroit. The clever staging and setting (scenic design by Chris Broom) threads their story into the book-banning story, with Lily and Joshua conversing while library work or a meeting forms a tableau around or behind them. Basil and Menu-Ra have personal chemistry and are believable in their conversations as old friends with childhood memories. Basil is smiling and bubbly as a young mom and Menu-Ra is a serious man with societal goals that we learn about later.
Actor Scott Olson plays many roles here and he does well in all of them; he portrays a reporter and Senator Higgins’ colleague, Bobby Crone, as well as author Garth Williams.
The play is smoothly directed by Robison, who uses the bookstore event space smartly to change scenes and move characters in and out. The only problem with the bookstore setting is the lack of theatrical lighting; the space’s overhead lights illuminate the scenes but without the nuances you gain with theatrical lighting. Costume design is by Gabriela Carrillo. Megan Lorie is dialect coach. Stage manager is Clara Radcliffe.
Garth Williams was a prolific and successful author and illustrator of books for children and young adults, including such classics as Stuart Little, Charlotte’s Web and The Little House on the Prairie. Williams wrote and/or illustrated many of the Little Golden Books. In fact, when I described the Alabama Story on a family Zoom call on Sunday, my middle-aged son brought out his vintage copy of The Sailor Dog, a Little Golden Book written by Margaret Wise Brown and illustrated by Garth Williams.
Alabama Story by Ghostlight Ensemble was performed for two weekends at After-Words Bookstore, 23 W. Illinois St., and continues for the next two weekends (October 11-13 and October 18-20) at Haymarket Books at Haymarket House, 800 W. Buena Ave. Tickets are pay what you can with an average donation of $25 per ticket. Running time is two hours with one intermission.
For more information on this and other plays, see theatreinchicago.com.
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