This column appeared in the Wednesday (1.25.06) Tribune & Georgian newspaper.
This May, if you take exit 93 off I-65 and travel west about 30 miles to Monroeville, Alabama, a sleepy town of 7,000 souls in southwestern Alabama, you probably won’t see her. Town folks will be mum about speculations and even turn away from any questions as to whether she’s in town. But you won’t see her in Monroeville at this season because she has never seen the spectacle that brings more than 5,000 strangers to town each year and more than 30,000 to the town the rest of the year. Even though she authored it and lives with the spectacle that has surrounded it for almost a half century, Harper Lee doesn’t like trading on her book’s fame and popularity; audiences on the other hand, love the ideas, characters and symbols present in “To Kill A Mockingbird.”
Each May, the Monroe County Heritage Museums does, however, deploy all its resources annually to create a stage version of “To Kill A Mockingbird.” It has taken on the feeling of a holy grail to the folks that live here, those that re-create the book’s powerful scenes, and those that make the pilgrimage to sit in the outdoor staging area on benches and see it, many more than once. Pastor’s, lawyers, policemen, county commissioners, moms, teenagers, firefighters, teachers, foresters, and other townspeople star in the play they say sends a “message of racial tolerance.” They have performed it not only in tiny Monroeville, but also on stages in Washington, DC; Hull, England; and Jerusalem. So ingrained is the play and its processes into the town’s culture, that a local actor once signed a check with his character’s name and it cleared the local bank.
In a unique turn, the play casts audience members as jurors. So involved do they become that they often quarrel about whether to acquit Tom Robinson, the accused. While of course they eventually must convict (according to the script), this is just one example of the power of word and stage. So for 16 performances a year, Monroeville trades on its fame and its possibilities. It escapes the humdrum of a drive for miles behind omni-present log trucks and radio broadcasts of ever-present airwave evangelists for a few days, and offers visitors a special glimpse into souls that are both good and evil.
This possibility exists for us, too. When “Crooked Rivers: Sisters Three” appears in April and May this year at Crooked Rivers State Park, we will begin the tradition of telling the tales, sharing the lives and commenting on the vagaries that surround our community’s history. We will sit outdoors, conjoined in spirit with congruent actors and playgoers in Monroeville, AL, all of us wondering if we can attain a similar success and fate.
Opportunities for this week and upcoming weeks: celebrate Mozart’s 250th birthday with the Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra, TCU, 1.26, 7:30 p.m.; great guitar and jazz combines with Bela Fleck and the Flecktones, UNF, 7:30 p.m.; create your own art with your kids at JMOMA’s Family Art Class, 1.28, 2 p.m.; listen minute by minute to superstar Michael McDonald, Florida Theatre, 1.29, 8 p.m.; Soweto Gospel Choir, Florida Theatre, 2.3, 8 p.m.; try out new musical theatre on Amelia Island with “Bookstore” at Fernandina Bch Middle School, starts 1.28, 8 p.m.; and “Almost Abba” at Alhambra Dinner Theatre, 1.24 to 2.5.
(Cathy Newman of National Geographic is responsible for the idea for this week’s column. My thanks and acknowledgements to her.) If you have ideas or events you want me to share with readers, send me a note at pkraack1@tds.net.
1.25.05
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