Review: Alfred Molina and John Douglas Thompson Square Off in Blustery Inherit the Wind

When a decades-old play focuses on the separation of church and state, the muzzling of free thought, and the demonizing of science, it’s easy to draw parallels between the play’s setting and the current state of the USA. Pasadena Playhouse’s production of Inherit the Wind, unfortunately, disappoints despite the electric chemistry of its two stars, Alfred Molina and John Douglas Thompson. Director Michael Michetti has chosen to give the play a contemporary feel — with a cast that looks and sounds like modern-day Americans — but in so doing, the play loses the intensity that comes from seeing the present through a lens of the past.

Originally written and performed on Broadway in 1955, Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee’s play is inspired by the 1925 Scopes “Monkey” Trial, in which a Southern teacher (Abubakr Ali) faces prison for teaching evolution to his class in a right-wing religious town where the scripture is as good as law. In the play, Matthew Harrison Brady (Thompson), a famed politician and biblical expert, leads the prosecution, while a version of Clarence Darrow named Henry Drummond (Molina) defends the teacher. The two attorneys, though once friends, clash in the courtroom as Drummond puts Christian fundamentalism on trial.

Michetti’s has opted for a bare-bones set — a few chairs and tables, and bleachers shared by the actors and audience. The characters don’t wear suits, but rather jeans, flannels, and T-shirts (costumes by Sara Ryung Clement). Minimalist stagecraft can be effective, but here it takes the audience out of the proceedings instead of enhancing their experiences. Even the buttoned-up rabble-rouser Brady, a character who would never be without a three-piece suit in public, is in jeans, a button-down shirt, and hiking boots. The cast also wanders around the stage and interacts with the audience, but it’s not clear why.

Lawrence and Lee’s play has some cobwebs — several characters are barely sketched out and seem more like mouthpieces than fully-formed beings — and the slow pacing, particularly in the court scenes, exasperates the issue. What’s more, Michetti doesn’t create enough tension during the course of the play to give the climax the intensity it might have had. Michetti does set a pious mood with church hymns sung by the cast. The voices, with help by both vocal arranger Darryl Archibald and vocal director Jeffrey Bernstein, sound heavenly.

Molina perfectly captures the shrewd and calculating defense attorney, searching for truth, not fame nor power. As his counterpoint, Thompson brings humanity to the devout and single-minded Brady. Though their final confrontation needed more fire, their first act conversation reflects a respect and admiration the two lawyers once had for each other. Rachel Hilson, as the teacher’s female friend, conveys the skittishness of a cat in a thunderstorm. She brings a heartbreakingly lost quality to her earlier scenes, but always imbues it with a decency to make the character’s final courage believable.

Ali is miscast as the teacher. He presents his character as too young and immature to be an inspirer who has risked everything for his unpopular beliefs. Chris Perfetti as the journalist also gives an off-putting performance that takes an underwritten character and turns him in to a slug. As the town’s preacher, David Aaron Baker has a stirring scene in which he unleashes his wrath at anyone who thinks differently than he. Marlene Forte, as Mrs. Brady, gives her character’s husband more layers, particularly fragility despite all the bluster, by expressing her love and dedication to him. Michael Kostroff, always a scene stealer, is hysterical as the goofy town mayor.

Michetti would have done better to trust the text of the play to deliver the message. Inherit the Wind has relevance today, but this production doesn’t seem to have faith in the word.