So there’s this family called Longborn, wallowing in Longborn Hollow, Tennessee. (Pronounced “Longborn Holler.”) The eldest son is handsome but shy, while the second son—Bennett is his name—is perceptive, smarter than anyone in those parts, and plays a mean banjo. A big city social influencer millionairess named Bing comes to town to buy the grand “Netty’s Field” estate, bringing along her even richer friend Darcy Fitzwilliam, the outspoken heiress to Pemberly Studios in New York City, who looks askance at everybody until—fighting her first impressions—she falls hard for Bennett and his banjo.
Look, Jane, they’ve done it again!
By this point in time, poor Jane Austen has been ravaged and rifled through so many times by so many writers in search of better material than they themselves can think up that this here Pride and Prejudice in Skunk Holler, or wherever, should come as no surprise. The present specimen is called Prejudice and Pride, which gives you an idea where they’re heading even before the very first twang. The musical originated at Music Theater Heritage Artist Residence program in Kansas City.
What’d Oscar Hammerstein say about Kansas City? No matter.
In this particular Austenish milieu, the Bennet girls are boys while the Bingley and Darcy characters are women. A gender-wise bow to the current social upheaval? Nope; or maybe; or who knows? Perhaps it’s just because composer-lyricist Samuel Wright, who undertakes the role of Elizabeth Bennet—or, rather, Bennett Longborn—plays the banjo and leads the three-piece band.
In an unusual curtain call at a press preview attended, Wright noted that he and director/co-bookwriter Nicholas Collett and everyone involved are newcomers to the field. He confessed that they didn’t know much about what they were doing, or how they even managed to get their little show to New York, and that writing and producing a musical is mighty hard. Wright seemed so earnest and likable in this, that we wish him well.
They all mean well, yes; and it seems like they all—“they” being the cast and production team—are based in Kansas City (other than the British director). Given the circumstances, I shall cite only Bridget Casad, who wraps her Darcy in layers of attitude and seems to know what she’s doing, and PT Mahoney as Jake, the Jane Bennet character, who is quiet but funny in a lanky string bean sort of manner and might fit well in Shucked down at Netherfield, or Netty’s Field, or Nederlander’s Field.
Let me add that there is one surprisingly well-wrought song somewhere in the second act called “Dear Bennett,” which replaces Darcy’s remarkable response to Lizzy’s refusal of marriage (Chapter XXXV) and actually fits the concept.
The villain, lest you wonder, is a long-legged gal in black shorts called Victoria Wick Hamm who has a longstanding feud with Darcy. Wick Hamm runs off with Lizzy’s – or rather, Bennett’s—younger sibling Lydia. Err, Lyle. And Wickham, in this genteel Jane Austen musical, ends up sentenced to 22 years for sedition, inciting a riot, kicking an officer in the dick (there’s a rhyme there, somewhere) and “public defecation.”
Where’d I leave my smelling salts?
Prejudice and Pride opened July 18, 2023, at 59E59 and runs through August 20. Tickets and information: 59e59.org
