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I never seem to get tired of shows like this.

Saturday May 05, 2001.     By Joseph Bowen

Theater Feed

Northlight Theatre
Tickets: (847) 673-6300
Through January 2

I never seem to get tired of shows like Dinah Was, a flattering and also not so flattering portrait of Dinah Washington, the immensely talented jazz diva of the 1950's and early 60's. One might compare Dinah Was to shows like Love, Janis, which played at the Royal George earlier this season. In both shows, you see how the music affects the singer's life, and vice versa. But unlike Love, Janis, Dinah Was is an interesting, effective, consistent piece of theatre.

As Dinah Washington, E. Faye Butler, in an absolutely powerhouse performance, grabs your attention from her first entrance. Dinah Was opens in 1960 at the Sahara hotel in Las Vegas. Dinah Washington, who was the first black woman to perform in Las Vegas, sweeps into the hotel wearing her white mink coat, only to be told that she cannot stay in the hotel, and is instead relegated to a trailer in the Sahara's parking lot. She decides to sit down in the lobby to wait for a hotel room and the show is off and running. We go back and forth in the life of Dinah Washington, born Ruth Jones, and raised on Chicago's South Side. We see her tumultuous relationship with her disapproving mother, meet two of her seven husbands (both played by Darryl Alan Reed), her agent (Jeffrey Hutchinson), her assistant (Carla J. Hargrove), the racist hotel manager (Matt DeCaro), and many others, all performed by four actors. All of this is interspersed with Dinah Washington's music, which is wisely selected to aid in the storytelling. As the show progresses, we learn more about Dinah that we perhaps want to know, but Dinah Was would not be honest if it didn't show you the truth. This is not just a historical portrait; it is a history lesson.

Director David Petrarca stages this piece with great style, moving the action seamlessly from location to location. Jason Robert Brown's musical direction is masterful; splendidly recreating Dinah Washington's sound, and the sound of the period. The only stumbling block is Michael Yeargen's imposing blue brick set. The sheer size and the lack of fluidity with which it moves is distracting, something that could have been deadly were the show in front of it not so electric.

Every member of the cast deserves praise for their versatility, especially Carla J. Hargrove, who effectively plays Dinah's beleaguered assistant, her domineering mother, and also gets a start turn as Violet, a kitchen worker at the Sahara, who gets to sing a duet with Dinah onstage at the Sahara. But it is E. Faye Butler, as Dinah, to whom the show belongs. She is blessed with so much vocal power, but at the same time is capable of so much quiet emotion, that you gladly take the ride with her.

Although there are some details that you won't learn from Dinah Was, you will leave the theatre with a renewed sense of respect for this talented and tortured diva who led too short a life. A good time to be had by all indeed.