Tom at Theatricum Botanicum (Photo – Ian Flanders)
Summer is fading fast, and if you haven’t yet visited the magical Will Geer’s Theatricum Botanicum in Topanga Canyon for one of their annual Shakespeare productions, the annual blues festival, or one of their always excellent original plays or adaptations, I highly recommend that your first choice be “Tom.” So pack a picnic to enjoy in the garden outside the theater before the play, enjoy the fresh air and the smell of the forest, then get ready to have your emotions stimulated intensely and taken through the gamut from anger to respect to disgust to joy to sadness to shame. I am still in awe that these actors can wring themselves out in this play over and over.
By Carol Edger Germain
The play is adapted from “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” by Ellen Geer, the granddaughter of Will Geer, presented with an elderly Harriet Beecher Stowe, the author of the original story series, as a character in the play, still considering and rewriting her story of outrage at the treatment of human beings as “things,” as property. It is 35 years later in this version, and the perceived notion that because the Civil War is over, the slaves are free, and all is well is contested by Stowe. As we know a century later, all was not well and is still not well today. Her continuing feisty protest of the routine of slavery, ripping families apart, and continuing the buying, selling and torturing of “free” human beings, is the catalyst for her onsite narration of the play. Melora Marshall is compelling as Stowe, and you feel her angst and passion, trying to find a better ending to her story than reality (historians have noted her obsession with the story, and her likely diagnosis of Alzheimer’s, in her later years).
“Tom” play (Photo – Ian Flanders).
Gerald C. Rivers as Tom brings depth to the stereotypical modern concept of “Uncle Tom” as a meek and subservient man. His mental, physical, and spiritual strength serves those around him as he willinging absorbs and deflects as much of the cruelty spewed by the masters as possible in order to propel the others forward to a hopefully a new autonomous life. The large cast gives many individual performances their moment in the spotlight, and I especially appreciated Earnestine Phillips as Aunt Chloe, Thad Geer as Simon Legree, Tim Halligan as Haley, and Mark Lewis as Augustine St. Clare. Jasmine Gatewood, Durant Fowler, and Shannon Shepherd were also standouts. As always, the natural forest setting, hills, bridges, and trees provide an expansive stage, and this play made masterful use of the “free props” available that perfectly suited the action of the story.
Theatricum Botanium has been named as “One of the 50 Coolest Places in Los Angeles” by Buzz magazine, “One of Southern California’s most beguiling theater experiences” by Sunset magazine, and “Best Theater in the Woods” by the LA Weekly. I heartily agree and urge you to get your ticket to “Tom” as well as some of the theater’s other offerings before it’s Fall and you’ve missed the season.
Tom Tom at Theatricum Botanicum in Topanaga Canyon (Photo – Ian Flanders)
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