Assembly Rooms, Front Room
Aug 25-27 (15:30)

Qui Desiderat Pacem Preparet Bellum

At its core, The Rosenberg/Strange Fruit Project is a diasporic tour of an America that created & envelop’d the bitter episode that was the trial execution of Julius & Ethel Rosenberg, accus’d of giving atomic secrets to the Russians. Creating for us the frantic & society icing it’s way into the Cold War are two performers; the orator, award-winning actor/playwright John Jiler, & the clarinetist Sweet Lee Odom, who accompanies the words, along with occasional American life-sounds pip’d into the background for extra effect.

The play is essentially a monologue of disparate characters, unified by the desperate tragedy of the youngest son of the Rosenbergs, Robert, orphan’d by paranoid anti-communist McCarthyism & a heavily flaw’d prosecution. After this twist of the knife, came the twist of life which saw the Robert adopted by the man who wrote the song Strange Fruit, seared into public consciousness by Billie Holiday. Among all the scenes, the most moving was when Robert was visiting his mother in prison, with her maternal instinct playing down the best she could the fact that she & his father would soon be fried electrically at Sing-Sing. Poor thing.

The Rosenberg/Strange Fruit Project is heavily Americanised – Shylo, Bull Run, Ike leaving his balls in Normandy, Du Bois, etc.. Multiple references from Stateside history that over ninety nine percent of the Brits cannot relate to. However, at the end of this curious play, the whole room rose & ovated their hearts out with pure off-broadway adulation – perhaps they were mainly American, who knows? Alas, I didn’t quite share the praise-giving, let alone the prize-giving which my role as a reviewer entails.

Saying that, many, many nice touches abounded; subtle costume changes, mysterious jazz sounds cleverly caressing us into the story, & some top notch delivery from Jiler, all fashion a very pleasant spectacle – but I was never gripp’d theatrically. It felt more like non-fiction, rather than a play, however well it was perform’d. I think with such a complex story, more actors are vital – that was my instinct – because, altho Jiler is excellent, it was difficult to suspend one’s disbelief thro the rapidity of character changes. I think, if I wasn’t also trying to assimlate the American cultural references, it might have been easier, but it is a lot to take in otherwise.

Damo