By Ruth Leon
23 Oct 2009

Stephanie Umoh and Quentin Earl Darrington in rehearsal
photo by Aubrey Reuben

Ragtime, the Tony Award-winning musical about the American melting pot bubbling over, returns to Broadway.

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1906 — The start of the American Century; the end of European domination. The music on the streets of New York was syncopated, its rhythms irregular and joyous, emerging from the influences of a hundred different musics from a hundred different places, coming together to form a uniquely American sound — ragtime. And what it symbolized for the immigrants arriving via Ellis Island, for the newly emancipated African-Americans making their way to the big cities, and for those whose ancestors had come to the New World seeking a better life, was hope.

America, particularly for those of us not born here, has always been a destination of hope. Here, we immigrants believe, we can find a better life, more opportunities, a place to develop our talents, a home. And so it has proved, never more so than at the beginning of the 20th century.

Ragtime, the 1998 Broadway musical based on E.L. Doctorow's 1974 novel, is back on Broadway after a recent run at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. It tells the story of hope through the intersecting paths of three families: a rich white couple in New Rochelle struggling to emerge from the strictures of the Victorian age; a black musician from Harlem radicalized by a meaningless act of violence, while the mother of his child seeks shelter; and a Jewish immigrant learning to provide for his daughter through an entirely new and American art.

This newest production is directed by Marcia Milgrom Dodge. "We tell the story of these diverse families ferociously struggling for their identity amid the many obstacles placed in their paths," says Dodge.

Woven into their stories are the iconic characters of their age, real people such as Emma Goldman, the political firebrand; Henry Ford, who had just perfected the Model T; chorus girl Evelyn Nesbit, whose lover killed for her; Houdini, the escapologist; and many others who helped to shape the vibrant and dynamic society that America, and especially New York, became. Their songs are anthems of the future, of the brand new world they are making, and of their former, clashing worlds, which have to be reconciled. Many, if not most, were immigrants or freed slaves, whose contributions to the culture had never before been acknowledged. Now they brought what they could of their talents and influences from their former homes, jettisoned the rest, and became Americans. They embodied the hopes and dreams of an entire continent, bursting with life — technological, artistic, social, mercantile, spiritual — and they made a country full of confidence in itself, all to the accompaniment of ragtime music.

This, then, is the background to Ragtime, and it is what makes it one of the most important musicals of the last quarter of the 20th century. The difficult task of adapting an overflowing novel to the musical stage was undertaken by playwright Terrence McNally, composer Stephen Flaherty and lyricist Lynn Ahrens for the Broadway premiere in 1998 (it played Toronto before that), but it is surely even more significant today, when we have an African-American in the White House and the journey towards what the Constitution calls "a more perfect union" is so much further advanced.

Dodge, making her Broadway directorial debut, is best known for the fluidity of her choreographic style and her risk-taking. "It took me 30 years to become an overnight success!" she laughs.

She recognizes how the hope that has re-energized the world over the past few months will help fuel excitement for this newest production. "There’s a little magic in this production. I never want to be so explicit that there's no room for the audience to participate...We have fluid transitions from scene to scene — no waiting, no literal depictions, a very impressionistic approach."

But despite the weight of history, Dodge is clear on what she is doing here: "I tell the actors that we are storytellers — not historians. Our task is to translate all these sincere emotions and desires into authentic and full-bodied characters that live truthfully inside of our new Ragtime for the 21st century."

Ragtime is, in a word, America in its best and worst aspects. Here is indifference, racism, bigotry and violence. But here too is heroism, idealism, progress and compassion. And ragtime. Always ragtime.

Stephen Flaherty, Lynn Ahrens, Terrence McNally and director/choreographer Marcia Milgrom Dodge
photo by Aubrey Reuben

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