FreeFall Theatre in St. Petersburg stages ‘Assassins’
Its dramatic personae makes up undoubtedly the most sinister lineup in musical theater history: John Wilkes Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme and John Hinckley are just a few of its many nefarious characters.
Stephen Sondheim‘s 1990 “Assassins” is populated mostly by real-life men and women who tried to kill American presidents. Many, like Booth and Oswald, succeeded. Fromme, Hinckley and others failed.
It’s not a frequently produced musical, but two versions are coming to the area in October. The first opens this weekend, at freeFall Theatre, an excellent Equity theater in St. Petersburg. Before the run of freeFall’s production ends, the Manatee Players production opens right here in Bradenton on Oct. 27. So for a couple of weeks we’ll be treated to dueling “Assassins.”
It’s a smart, challenging show with no songs that are likely to be familiar to people who haven’t seen the show or listened to the cast recordings.
The assassins interact with each other — at one point Booth encourages Giuseppe Zangara to kill Franklin Roosevelt (which Zangara did indeed try to do). Sondheim’s songs (he wrote both the lyrics and the music) vary in style to reflect the era of the historical assassins.
Some of the most intriguing assassins in the show are the obscure ones, including Zangara, who succeeded in killing the mayor of Chicago; Leon Czolgosz, who killed William McKinley; and especially Samuel Byck, who tried to highjack a plane and fly it into the White House in order to assassinate Richard Nixon.
The music is as dense and rewarding as the book by John Weidman, who’s probably best known for the 1987 version of “Anything Goes.”
Details: Oct. 8-Nov. 6, freeFall Theatre, 6099 Central Ave, St. Petersburg. 7 p.m. Wednesday-Thursday, 8 p.m. Friday, 2 and 7 p.m. Saturday, 1 and 7 p.m. Sunday. $25-$52. 727-498-5205, freefalltheatre.com.
Marty Clear: 941-708-7919, @martinclear
This story was originally published October 5, 2016 at 5:17 PM with the headline "FreeFall Theatre in St. Petersburg stages ‘Assassins’."