The Broadway Theatre Review: Suffs

By Ross

“Let Mother vote!” they sing in the altogether different beginning of Broadway’s new musical, Suffs. Altered from the staging at The Public Theater a few years ago. Gone are the vaudevillian-style clowns with fake mustaches, top hats, and tails. In their place are the members of the all-female old guard, asking, ever so politely, for a Mother’s permission to vote directed at their sons, a framework that does eventually sway the vote their way. It’s a stronger, classier beginning, presented with a wise wink and grin as the historical tale unveils itself with its newly sharpened inquisitive deep dive into the complex camaraderie of the women who forcibly brought forth the 19th amendment to the United States and the courageous ones who stood their ground until the right to vote was won.

With a strong skilled cast, Suffs, the new Broadway musical, unpacks the somewhat shocking and difficult mountain these dedicated suffragists climbed to bring forth change and enlightenment into the unfair world where women were not granted the right to vote alongside their husbands, fathers, and sons. The imbalance is clearly laid out throughout, and as directed with clarity and vision by Leigh Silverman (Broadway’s Grand Horizons), it is presented most beautifully and intelligently, particularly in one tenacious love song about what marriage actually means to a woman. Played out wisely between a young determined woman, Doris Stevens, smartly portrayed by Nadia Dandash (“Pretty Little Liars: Summer School“), and her somewhat confused male counterpart, Dudley Malone, portrayed strongly by Tsilala Brock (Barrington’s Blues for an Alabama Sky), the two, in a touching subtle flirtation, clarify the misogyny that the world is offering a woman when she accepts a marriage proposal. “Marriage is essentially a death trap for women,” Stevens informs in a manner that both surprises and educates the thoughtful Malone. The song is both tender and sweet, while also laying out the hard-truth imbalance for the unknowing to see and realize. And it does the job, both within the man and the delightfully wise production, written, in all aspects, by the ever-impressive Shaina Taub (Public’s Twelfth Night).

Dudley Malone, thanks to this musical interlude choreographed with charm and focus by Mayte Natalio (Broadway’s How to Dance…), and as history and Suffs inform us, becomes a significant member of the movement, shifting his perspective and resigning from Woodrow Wilson’s administration for his failure to take up or support the Woman Suffrage Amendment to the Constitution. Although all of this is historically accurate and well-known walking in, the way Taub lays it out is beyond smart. She seems to intuitively know her knowledgeable audience well, and delivers forth that tricky balance of informing the informed without ever feeling that we are being lectured or talked down to.

The revamped and elevated musical, new to Broadway, sings out strong and clear, and although the passing of the Nineteenth Amendment involved men in all of the three branches of the U.S. government, headed by then President Wilson, played here most beautifully by Grace McLean (Broadway’s Natasha, Pierre…), Taub finds her careful focus within the complicated band of brave women who worked diligently together to secure the right for women to vote. Their female union is wonderfully displayed, but not without conflict, and Taub, who wrote the book, music, and lyrics for this new musical (while also taking on the force of nature at the center of the fight, Alice Paul), treats their interpersonal dynamics of the women with the utmost respect unwrapping all the complexity that they deserve.

Their path is multi-dimensional, and not without discomfort and discord. The formulation of these core women; Alice Paul, her loyal friend, Lucy Burns, played heroically by the wonderful Ally Bonino (Off-Broadway’s Dogfight); the socialite warrior-queen, Inez Milholland, gloriously played by the formidable Hannah Cruz (MCC’s The Connector), the socialist warrior, Ruza Wenclawska, deliciously portrayed by Kim Blanck (Signature’s Octet); and Dandashi’s steadfast and true Doris Stevens; form loyalist camaraderie in their internal fire and within debate. Just as it should be. Each has their specific worldview, and although the consensus-building within the group is not neat or as easy as maybe history would like to pretend to portray, Suffs succeeds in its mission; of climbing up the stairs to equality with a clarity of vision and an astute air of conviction that does the movement proud, mainly because it holds tight to the individuals at the center, and the conflicts that reside within.

Inside the stirring music and wise lyrics, the musical, led with grace by music director Andrea Grody (Broadway’s The Band’s Visit) with orchestrations by Michael Starobin (LCT’s The Gardens of Anuncia), never loses its vital steam, finding its clear footing within the narrative of the progressive firecracker, Alice Paul (Taub). This powerhouse woman exudes a passionate understanding of what is needed, and doesn’t have the patience to wait it out politely like the old guard of the movement would like her to do. She strides forward without ever really looking back, even when stymied and sidelined by the formidable Carrie Chapman Catt, played to perfection by Jenn Colella (Broadway’s Come From Away), the strongly liked president of the National American Woman Suffrage Association and the founder of the League of Women Voters and the International Woman Suffrage Alliance, who promotes polite patience over aggressive action.

Catt, one of the best-known women in the United States in the first half of the twentieth century for her role in the movement, finds Alice Paul a bitter and troublesome new pill to swallow, one she can’t seem to control like the rest of ladies who gather around her. Colella grabs hold of the part and delivers her solidly, epitomized by her magnificent rendition of “This Girl.” Her road to equality is to not “antagonize, irritate, enervate” the men, but to play nice, and make an appointment for tea with dignity and feminine gentleness. But Taub’s Alice doesn’t see it that way at all. This young woman is tired of waiting and playing by Catt’s old-school rule book. She wants progress, and to step up the movement by organizing a protest march on Washington to shake the movement from the ground up. “We need to stand up and demand our rights,” she states with a wide-eyed conviction. And the only way forward for this “Great American Bitch” is to fight the big fight without hesitation.

The contentious origins of the women’s rights movement drive the whole experience forward with determination and flair. There is a lot of history to cover here, and the piece tries to occupy as much of the historical space as possible, delivering forth the delicate issues of race and racism into the mix most beautifully. As the dynamic and outspoken investigative journalist, educator, and early leader in the civil rights movement Ida B. Wells, the magnetic Nikki M. James (Broadway’s The Book of Mormon) ushers forth one of the most powerfully engaging declarations of the movement with her commanding “Wait My Turn.” It’s a full-on showstopper, catapulting the moment and the song into something beyond great. The demand and the statement ring hard, strong, and true, even as we uncomfortably watch Alice try to sideline Ida for what she believes to be for the greater good. In reality, Alice is undeniably in the wrong. And in that hardheadedness, the imperfectness of Alice begins to show, which, in all honesty, serves the musical very well indeed. None of these women are without their flaws, and in that historical arena, Taub does them all justice.

On the simplistic, yet effective set, designed with a clear intuitive vision by Riccardo Hernandez (Broadway’s The Thanksgiving Play) with strong lighting by Lap Chi Chu (Broadway’s Camelot), killer costuming by Paul Tazewell (Broadway’s Ain’t Too Proud), and a solid sound design by Jason Crystal (“Annie: Live!“), Suffs sounds the charge with inspiring and persuasive songs like “Finish the Fight”, “Find a Way”, and “How Long?” Each ignites the fire that lives inside Alice, who has set aside all ladylike manners and desires espoused by Catt and society to give fire to her voice and her fight even when it gets dangerous and downright dirty.

It’s a powerful, very thoughtfully created story that Taub wants to tell, and even throughout the silent protests and acts of civil disobedience that land the women in jail, the horrors inflicted elevate the musical to new heights of enlightenment, adding unforeseen power and connection to the eventual outcome song “Keep Marching“. “How long must women wait?” they sing, rightfully and majestically, as these dynamic and talented women demand equality so beautifully and with such faith and passion that we can’t help but give them the standing ovation they, and their theatrical counterparts, deserve. Broadway’s Suffs, wisely and wonderfully, delivers it all with a strong emotional punch to the gut, as Taub wisely reminds us that “the work is never over” and it can’t be done alone.