Critic’s Pick
Violet was a hit for Ensemble Theatre back in 1999, at a time when ETC was struggling to survive and audiences were hesitant to venture to Over-the-Rhine. What a difference 17 years have made: Today ETC is an anchor in the bustling restaurant and entertainment district. Jeanine Tesori and Brian Crawley’s heartfelt, anthem-filled musical could be a kind of metaphor for a theater that struggled to find its place in the world. It’s about an angry, self-conscious young woman who believes her life is a dead end because of a disfiguring facial scar, the result of a horrific accident with an axe blade caused by her father. Like Violet, on a desperate search for her true self, ETC has found its way.
ETC’s 30th anniversary season has offered winning productions from start to finish, but Violet is a remarkably satisfying capstone, polished and passionately performed in every aspect. Brooke Steele is breathtaking as the angular, awkward Violet, desperately seeking a televangelist who she believes can miraculously remove her scar. Steele’s stiff posture and hair masking her scar (which is not physically represented), delivers an aching, anxious performance that has momentary flashes of joy. Her performance is one audiences will long remember.
On a long-haul bus ride in 1964 from rural home North Carolina to a TV studio in Tulsa, Violet shares her pilgrimage with an array of people who broaden her horizons. Phillip Johnson-Richardson and Mark Beyer play a pair of brash, coming-of-age soldiers, one black, one white, both attracted to Violet — who is challenged to accept their attention. Director Lynn Meyers has assembled a cast of powerful singers, several of whom play multiple roles and have memorable pop-out vocal numbers.
L-R: Brooke Steele and Delaney Ragusa / Photo: Ryan Kurtz
Delaney Ragusa plays Violet’s precocious younger self, and the SCPA ninth-grader holds her own in a production full of standout singers. Charlie Clark is Violet’s tortured father, coping with the absence of his wife and guilt over the accident. But he helps young Violet with a math lesson using poker (“Luck of the Draw”) that provides the adult Violet a skill set to cope with the larger world.
ETC has followed a path parallel to Violet’s, and it’s already proving to be another hot ticket for the theater, with several performances selling out already.
VIOLET, presented by Ensemble Theatre Cincinnati, continues through May 22.
This article appears in May 4-11, 2016.
