Sure, on October 16 th , when RAGTIME opened at Vivian
Beaumont Theatre, the cast performed magnificently.
Everyone wanted to please those opening night reviewers
and influencers in the audience.
But now that those writers and podcasters are long gone,
there’s no guarantee that performers will maintain their
greatness during a run of eight performances a week after
week after week.
With previews having started in late September, some in the
cast may have by now succumbed to boredom or even
apathy. The expressions “walking through it” and “phoning it
in” exist for good reason.
So, I decided to attend a performance on Wednesday,
January 7 th and purposely chose the matinee. Would the cast
give less than 100%, knowing that after finishing the
arduous three-hour show at 5 p.m., that in only three hours
more, they’d have to perform for three more hours?
How nice to be able to report that for the 115 th performance,
the cast gave as fresh and powerful a RAGTIME as it did on
opening night.
Perhaps they feel that when you’re doing a masterpiece –
which RAGTIME is – you must rise to the occasion.
The opening number suggested that they would excel all
performance long. Of course, the powerful applause that
greeted one of Broadway’s all-time best title songs benefited
from the sharp direction from Lear deBessonet as well as
blithe choreography by Ellenore Scott. How perfectly they
positioned the WASPS who, in 1906, were living the high life

while newly arrived immigrant Jews wee far from
experiencing it. As for the Blacks, their escape from hard
times was after-hours singing and dancing. Although the
point of the number is that each group is wary of the other,
de Bessonet and Scott created beautiful stage pictures.
Could it be, though, that some of the sustained applause for
this opening sequence came from theatergoers who knew
that RAGTIME had lost the Best Musical Tony to THE LION
KING? Here they’d take the opportunity to vote with their
hands and try to make up for the lack of appreciation that
had occurred 28 years ago.
Bookwriter Terrence McNally, in distilling E.L. Doctorow’s
1975 lengthy bestseller, retained the novelist’s choice of
giving many of his characters generic names: Father for the
WASP, and, for the Jew, Tateh (which indeed means Father).
That’s the only way in which they’re not distinctive.
Colin Donnell’s Father turned out to be still as potent as the
man of the New Rochelle house who slowly sees his power,
influence, and respect ebbing. Donnell hasn’t lost his grip on
a character who’s losing his grip on most everyone.
Donnell certainly got all the tension out of a scene near
show’s start, when Father boards the ship which will take
him near the North Pole. The captain introduces him to
Matthew Henson, his second-in-command, who’s played by
Black actor Alan Wiggins.
Is this non-traditional casting? We soon learn that it isn’t, for
when Henson extends his hand, Father stares it down. As the
musical continues, when a Black man offers his hand, Father
takes it. He’s learning.
That Black is the show’s centerpiece: Coalhouse Walker, Jr.
Joshua Henry remains spectacular in singing such masterful
Stephen Flaherty-Lynn Ahrens songs as the optimistic
“Wheels of a Dream” and anthems such as the grounded and

realistic “Make Them Hear You.” During the former, how he
makes us care, root for, and believe in him. By the time he
reaches the latter song, he’s so drawn us into one terrible
devastation and one even worse that we question the long-
held belief that two wrongs don’t make a right.
Nichelle Lewis is Sarah, the woman who loved him, believed
in him, and then (justifiably) hated him. Ah, but once after
she’s forgiven Coalhouse, she believes in him more than
ever.
That description alone shows how many emotions a
performer must bring to the role. Lewis did, while bringing
out strong feelings from the theatergoers; many stood after
she had poured out her heart, soul and more in “Your
Daddy’s Son” (even though a loud cougher hacked his way
through virtually the entire number).
As Mother, Caissie Levy continues to display elegance as well
as one of the greatest qualities a person can have: she treats
everyone the same. Although she starts off as the mother of
The Little Boy, she soon becomes a surrogate mother to
Sarah’s newborn that she finds in her garden.
When Coalhouse goes on a rampage, Father, both furious
and frightened, rebukes his wife for “foolish female
sentimentality. Levy’s silence and stalwartness silently
shows that she’s falling out of love with him. She’s still
displaying it superbly without remotely going over the top.
This leads us to her great final number, in which she
proclaims that she and Father can never go “Back to Before.”
She’s as pin-point perfect now as she had been 83 days
earlier.
Given that Levy expected RAGTIME to close its limited
engagement on January 4 th , the production is lucky to still
have her; she was set to star in the upcoming THE LOST
BOYS but decided to stay put. If you’re attending RAGTIME

between now and June 14, here’s betting that you’ll see as
splendid a performance.
In a way, Brandon Uranowitz plays two characters, a
different one in each act. In the first, he’s Tateh, the
immigrant who keeps his precious young daughter on a rope
lest someone harm her. All he has is artistic talent, but he
uses it and, yes, through a lucky circumstance, realizes that
a door has opened. He’ll enter it and rise to proverbial fame
and fortune.
That’s when he becomes the self-proclaimed Baron
Ashkenazy, aggrandized by his success in the new world of
motion pictures. Cockiness is often rejected by theatergoers,
but Uranowitz makes his so endearing that the crowd
gurgled with approval at his low-level braggadocio.
Back in 1997, ten-year-old Uranowitz was in the first
production of RAGTIME. He played The Little Boy, who’s both
a character and a narrator – but was replaced.
Don’t expect the Tony-winner to be replaced this time
around. As for RAGTIME, this instant classic will still be
produced in 30 or so years. We’re looking forward to seeing
Brandon Uranowitz as Grandfather, and expect he’ll be
superb no matter how long the run is.