T H E AT E R
BY RICK LEVIN
STEPHANIE PHILO
NEWMAN IN
COTTAGE THEATRE’S
PRODUCTION OF
ANNIE GET YOUR GUN
HER AIM IS TRUE
Cottage Theatre hits the bull’s-eye with Irving Berlin’s
classic musical Annie Get Your Gun
I
t’s not necessarily downbeat to claim that a given theatrical production is completely
carried by one performance in particular — to lavish praise on an actor who puts the
play on her back and carts it expertly and, of equal importance, joyously from her first
appearance on stage to the proverbial drop of the velvet curtain.
This is especially true in community theater, a distinctly democratic institution
where the egalitarian instinct gives a nudge to tender swaths of talent that blend in a stew
of ability, some of it realized but not always.
Which brings us to Stephanie Philo Newman’s turn as Annie Oakley in Cottage
Theatre’s current production of Annie Get Your Gun. Newman, who teaches theater arts at
Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, inhabits her role with such sassy aplomb that
she elevates this Irving Berlin classic into the realm of triumph.
Channeling such legends as Ethel Merman, Mae West and Irene Dunne, Newman gives
her Oakley just the right combination of hayseed charm, frontier grit and bubbling sex
appeal; her performance is at once orthodox and utterly modern, a nod to the tradition and
continuing relevance of musical theater.
Whether flirting with her gun-slinging foil Frank Butler (the well-matched Ward
Fairbain) or proving her worth as a tough woman capable of competing in a man’s world,
Newman exhibits the kind of lost-art versatility that made Broadway the toast of the world:
She can sing, dance, make funny, pitch woo and kick ass with the best of them.
As great as Newman is, it’s not as though the rest of the large cast scrambles to keep
up; rather, her infectious spirit seems to provide the necessary spark, spreading a sort of
giddy atmosphere throughout the production. Tony Rust, who directs, shows a real facility
for such traditional fare, giving the show a rapid clip that does honor to the lickety-split
comedy of mid-century musicals. Just the tap routine is worth the price of admission.
It must be said that, as a fictionalized account of Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show that
first hit the stage in 1946, Annie Get Your Gun (despite getting an update in 1999) does
contain outdated portrayals of Native Americans, especially in the person of Chief Sitting
Bull (Dale Flynn). This is not a trigger warning but instead a preventative plea against the
sort of reactive crap that throws the baby out with the bathwater.
To whit: You are entirely free to reject and revile this show, which, yes, trucks in
fanciful period stereotypes, but in so doing you may be participating in a bit of bourgeois
entitlement that perpetuates injustice in the act of negating it. I suggest, instead, that you
pay attention to these stereotypes, which often contain a devious and undermining critique
of the systems that give rise to them. ■
Annie Get Your Gun is playing now through May 1 at Cottage Theatre in Cottage Grove; $20-$25, tickets at
cottagetheatre.org or 942-8001.
eugeneweekly.com • A pril 14, 2016
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