Chagall In The Family

Before artist Marc Chagall died in 1997, he became the only living artist ever given an exhibition at the Louvre in Paris. How he got there is chronicled in The Road to Paris, a theatrical contribution to the metrowide Chagall Project, a multidisciplinary arts program for young people that involves the Children’s Museum, the Jewish Community Center and the integrated-arts organization Chameleon.

At a recent performance of the 45-minute musical play, written by Martha Sandven and composed by Daniel Robinson, nearly forty kids from the Niles Home for Children on East 23rd Street were gathered in their gymnasium. Before an archway Heather Lowenstein had painted with images representing Chagall’s work, six actors dramatized the artist’s eventful life.

Starting with his childhood in Russia, where Jewish children were not allowed to further their education after a certain age, the play follows Chagall (Tim Phillips) to Paris and into his golden years — he died two years shy of the century mark.

In the performance area, an opaque screen admirably serves the work of puppeteer Ted Nathanson. His shadow puppets document Chagall’s journeys to and from his homeland; his tenure as the founder of the Free Academy art school in Vitebsk, where a tiny brush and palette do a spirited dance; and the period when the Nazis stormed Paris. For that scene, which depicts Chagall leaving France for the United States (thanks to the Museum of Modern Art in New York), a swastika floats over a flaming city while the sound design reverberates with goose-stepping Third Reich troops.

Sandven directs the play, which the Children’s Museum commissioned to coincide with its Chagall for Children exhibition. There, young patrons can interact hands-on with re-creations of Chagall’s works. The third arm of the project features one of the artist’s stained-glass pieces at the Jewish Community Center.

“The Road to Paris is about overcoming adversity with creativity and using imagination to solve problems,” Sandven says. By the end of the summer, Chameleon will have visited more than fifty sites in the five-county metro. She adds that the troupe is still booking shows and hopes to continue into the school year.

At each site, kids prepare for the troupe with a 24-page activity book that addresses theater as an art form and includes biographical material about Chagall and his work. “The kids get to see a real evolution of the creative process,” says dramaturge Wolfgang Bucher. “They see, too, that art is constantly an evolution, which makes it more accessible.”

When Sandven presented the show at the Niles Home, she asked how many in the audience liked to paint or draw; nearly every hand shot up. As for the show’s relatively dark themes — two world wars and a fatal flu — the young people seemed thoroughly engaged. And in the post-show Q&A, the audience was most curious about puppetry and, oddly, the cast’s wigs, which subtly changed throughout the show to signify the principal characters’ advancing age.

Chameleon, which is housed in what Sandven calls “a Quonset hut” at 18th and Vine, presents public performances of The Road to Paris at 10 a.m., 1 p.m. and 7 p.m. on Thursday, August 7, at the Gem Theatre (18th and Vine). Groups interested in booking the show can call Bucher at 816-221-7529.

Postscript: If theatergoers think they’re imagining that an awful lot of shows are being staged at the Just Off Broadway space at 3051 Central, they’re not. “There’s been a marked increase in attendance over the last year,” says Bryan Colley, president of the Just Off Broadway Association.

Up to 24 performing groups consider the J.O.B. home, including InPlay, Mind’s Eye and Eubank Productions. What was once a stable for the police department’s horses has become a viable alternative space. In addition to presenting shows, J.O.B.’s dues-paying members contribute a little elbow grease and volunteer hours toward the venue’s upkeep.

The city’s Parks and Recreation Department seems to be a fan as well. Earlier this month, J.O.B. received $22,000 from the city for improved lighting in the parking lot, signs in Penn Valley Park (to direct audiences to a building that’s easy to see but hard to get to) and a protective canopy over the front door. The grant comes a year after the association made a formal request to the Public Improvements Advisory Committee.

Colley says the association and a group called Friends of Penn Valley made another request to the committee on July 10 in the hopes of being able to make more improvements next year.

In other news: Among the 5,419 people on hand at Starlight Theatre for the opening night of Thoroughly Modern Millie‘s national tour — which has made the transfer from Broadway to touring company with great pizzazz — was Tony Award-winning actor Jarrod Emick, spotted at intermission wearing a baseball cap and T-shirt. He was in Kansas City for the show because his girlfriend, Mia Price, plays Lucille (one of Millie’s housemates).

Emick won a Best Featured Actor in a Musical Tony for his work in the 1994 Damn Yankees revival. Since then, he’s appeared in the Broadway revival of The Rocky Horror Show (as Brad) as well as in Miss Saigon and the short-lived Fox soap Pacific Palisades. He was excited to talk about his newest gig, The Boy From Oz, opening on Broadway in October. In that musical bio of the late performer Peter Allen, who was once married to Liza Minnelli, Emick plays Allen’s boyfriend. And Allen’s being played by X-Men star Hugh Jackman. “Yes,” Emick confessed, “I’m playing Wolverine’s boyfriend.”