He spoke out about threats to the environment, he warned about the health risks associated with smoking and he decried the dangerous consequences of a culture marked more and more by violence.
Robert F. Kennedy took up such causes long before they became a part of the everyday political conversation in America. He took stands on the Civil Rights struggle, the Vietnam War and other pressing issues of the day, but Robert Kennedy also looked ahead to larger challenges facing the country; problems that wouldn’t fully surface for decades. Before his assassination on June 6, 1968, he had put together a presidential campaign that tackled issues that feel very real to fans and detractors of the Kennedy dynasty alike.
That immediacy is one of the most intriguing aspects of “RFK,” the one-man show running at the Vintage Theatre in Aurora. Directed by Terry Dodd and featuring James O’Hagan Murphy in a powerhouse performance as Kennedy, the drama by Jack Holmes is a visceral political portrait. Through a combination of imagined dialogues and actual excerpts from stump speeches and statements to the press, the show paints a vivid picture of Robert Kennedy in myriad roles.
We see Robert F. Kennedy as an upstart attorney general working in the administration of his brother John F. Kennedy in 1964. Holmes shows him as a stunned and grieving brother after JFK’s assassination in 1963; we see him as a son who struggled to find his own role in a high-profile family, as a husband and a father of 11. Starting in 1967, RFK is a New York senator working to carve out his own political path, navigating infighting in his own party and taking stands on controversial issues. Finally, there’s Robert Kennedy as a presidential candidate, an ambitious and controversial figure who vows that 1968 “will go down as the year that new politics began.”
The scope of the show is epic and the demands on the lead actor are considerable. Holmes’ show, which debuted Off-Broadway in 2005, skips back and forth between time and place. The dialogue weaves together imagined words and real excerpts from speeches by Kennedy, as well as a steady stream of quotes from writers ranging from Aeschylus to George Orwell.
O’Hagan Murphy takes up the burden beautifully. He nails the basics of Kennedy’s bearing and speech, speaking for two hours in the Massachusetts accent without falling in to caricature. More impressively, O’Hagan Murphy juggles the demands of Holmes’ intricate text. He paints a human portrait of Kennedy as a family man, he delivers some of RFK’s best-known public words with the fervor and cadence of a public speaker. He even excels in the small details of blocking a prop work. During the opening night performance, O’Hagan Murphy dropped a pair of reading glasses, picked them up and carefully wiped off the lenses, all the while delivering dense dialogue.
Director Terry Dodd and the Vintage crew are equally keen in their eye for detail. Luke Slotwinkski’s lighting design, for example, makes the one-man show in the Vintage’s small studio theater feel dynamic. A single red spotlight sets off O’Hagan Murphy at some of the show’s most tragic points. It lights the actor as he speaks of Lyndon Johnson’s decision to bomb Vietnam, it appears again at mentions of JFK’s assassination and other violent, tragic moments of the late 1960s.
Monica Horn’s set construction also plays a role in conveying the mood and tone of the times. The 70-seat Bond Trimble Theatre is made up to resemble RFK’s Senate office, but the space is far from an anonymous workspace of some Washington D.C. bureaucrat. Vintage Life magazines bearing cover images of John F. Kennedy line a desk, books of Greek philosophy sit on the table next to an easy chair and a large television set faces Robert Kennedy’s desk. The strains of Jimi Hendrix, Jefferson Airplane and Janis Joplin open up the second act, and the lights go up to reveal vinyl albums strewn about the small space.
Luke Terry’s sound design is just as subtle and just as effective. Specifically, the use of the 1968 news broadcast announcing Robert Kennedy’s assassination adds a somber touch to a vivid portrait.
All of these touches work well with Holmes’ text, a work that never shies away from Kennedy’s flaws and complications. As attorney general, RFK wire-tapped Martin Luther King Jr. His peers and the press described him as “ruthless” and a “rogue,” qualities that are clear in the recollections of some of the more dramatic struggles in the Senate and beyond.
But Robert Kennedy’s convictions also come through in the show. He fights for James Meredith’s right to attend college classes at the University of Mississippi, an integration that saw pushback from the state’s governor, Ross Barnett. He travels to the University of Alabama to personally see that two black students have the chance to attend classes. In his speech at the University of Capetown in South Africa in June of 1966, he speaks movingly and directly about Civil Rights and the legacy of slavery in the U.S.
Dodd and O’Hagan Murphy combine such public moments with a rich, troubled and nuanced personal portrait. The struggles of the 1960s feel immediate, and the legacy of Kennedy’s battles are easy to see in modern headlines and current woes.
THREE AND A HALF STARS OUT OF FOUR
“RFK” runs until Jan. 27 at the Vintage Theatre, 1468 Dayton St. Tickets start at $25. Information and showtimes: 303-856-7830 or vintagetheatre.com.
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