Honky-Tonk History
Thanks to the music, staged biography of country singer comes off with modest success
by Martin Brady
Stand by Your Man: The Tammy Wynette Story
Presented Through Oct. 28 at the Ryman Auditorium
$24, $32 adults; $12, $16 children under 12
For tickets, call 889-3060 or visit www.ryman.com
Tammy Wynette’s legacy is secure. For nearly 30 years she remained a force in country music, helping to build the bridge that linked the post-Patsy era to the pre-Shania era of female singers. Despite a somewhat turbulent personal life that included five marriages, illness, and drug dependence, Wynette piled up dozens of hits and awards before passing away in Nashville under somewhat cloudy circumstances on Apr. 6, 1998, a month shy of her 56th birthday.
Eventful lives often make for good biography, and the musical treatment of Wynette’s life currently running at the Ryman Auditorium is a flawed but musically potent portrayal of the lady’s life and times. The show’s strength is Tammy’s—almost 30 different songs, most of them drawn from the 20 No. 1 hits she posted through the years, including the famous series of duets she recorded with husband No. 3, the great George Jones.
The Ryman script, written by Mark St. Germain, is efficient though relatively unambitious. Despite some forays into Hee Haw-style humor—and one politically incorrect portrayal of a gay choreographer—Wynette’s rise from small-town Mississippi girl, teenage mother, and erstwhile hairdresser to big-time country singer is charted accurately enough, allowing for a few romantic liberties. There are some legit laughs along the way, mostly at the expense of Tammy’s marital challenges (in particular, the sincere but tenuous relationship with Jones).
Wynette’s more serious personal difficulties—rumors of drug use, various hospital stays, a peculiar incident of abduction, the revelation of provocative photos from her youth—are touched upon but not developed fully; if nothing else, this leaves plenty of room for the talented cast to regale the audience with classic country tunes. Among the selections are “D-I-V-O-R-C-E,” “My Man,” “ ’Til I Get It Right,” “You and Me,” and the title song, which functions as a rousing finale piece. The Wynette/Jones duets include “We’re Gonna Hold On,” “Golden Ring,” and “Near You,” as well as a nicely conceived Act 2 opener that weds, with effective irony, Wynette’s “ ’Til I Can Make It on My Own” to Jones’ “She Thinks I Still Care.”
Nicolette Hart is Tammy, and she is fine indeed. She’s got the look and the attitude, as well as the poised moves, of an assured actress. She also sings the Wynette catalog with authority and passion. Singer-songwriter Jim Lauderdale does an excellent job in portraying the enigmatic Jones. He skirts the edges of caricature, but ultimately avoids that pitfall through understated playing. Furthermore, his singing is right-on: Lauderdale hints at Jones’ distinctive vocal quirks without milking the style.
In an unusual but basically successful nod toward budget casting, the gifted members of the onstage band—Brad Albin, David Lutken, J. Robert Spencer, Kevin Owens, Miles Aubrey, and Galen Butler—pull double duty as actors, portraying Wynette’s husbands, suitors, and professional colleagues. Some of their performances are better than others. Susan Mansur is a solid and humorous presence in various roles, most importantly as Tammy’s mom. But if anyone steals this show, it is Tricia Paoluccio, a gifted, energetic, and attractive actress/singer who takes on no less than eight roles, ranging from the young Tammy to Dolly Parton, and delivers with noticeable panache in each instance.
Gabriel Barre’s direction is quite good throughout, the scenes moving crisply and consistently. Meanwhile, the music provides an enjoyable and authentic slice of a bygone Music Row era. At the risk of damning with faint praise, it can be said that Stand by Your Man is middlebrow entertainment at its finest.
Stylish and subtly scary
Fine (and Halloween-ready) entertainment is also afoot at Nashville Children’s Theatre, which on Monday opened Gatherings in Graveyards, a triptych of horror tales adapted quite effectively for the stage. Originally presented last year at the Coterie Theatre in Kansas City, the production comprises Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart,” W.W. Jacobs’ “The Monkey’s Paw,” and Ambrose Bierce’s “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge.”
Each story is laced with its own singular sense of ghostliness and irony, and, as ever, NCT brings high artistic values to the enterprise. Director René Copeland pulls the production together with marvelous style, not leastwise with her very own scenic design—an appropriately spooky cemetery that flexibly accommodates the three different settings. Karen Creel’s lighting and David Kiehl’s sound also add immeasurably to the overall effect: Moody, funkish music plays in the background, and actors’ giant-sized shadows are cast against the Hill Theatre’s far wall. Technical director Richard Neville injects some gothic mist onto the stage as needed, and provides a few modestly effective pyrotechnics as well, and Patricia Taber’s costumes are well crafted and period-appropriate.
Fitting nicely within the ghostly ambience is an excellent cast of local professionals. Veterans Mark Cabus and Brian Webb Russell handle the heaviest workload, backed up solidly by Jeff D. Boyet, Joshua Childs, and Kent Nichols. Rona Carter is the lone female, and she performs three roles (one in each play installment) with grace and versatility.
There are few joltingly terrifying moments in this production, yet tension and genuine suspense abound throughout. The acting is first-rate, the direction tight, and the three classic stories are told with all proper respect for the authors’ original, and subtler, intentions. This means that Nashville-area schoolchildren who desire gore and ghoulishness when they attend weekday performances could possibly be disappointed. Instead, they’ll have to make do with high-caliber theatre, of a kind that will be equally appealing to an adult audience. (But, of course, there isn’t anything wrong with that.)
Gatherings in Graveyards concludes its run with Weekend Family Series performances, 2:30 p.m. Oct. 27-28. Nashville Children’s Theatre is located at 724 2nd Ave. S. For ticket information, call 254-9103.
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