No easy answers, even for geniuses, in ‘My Lord, What a Night’

T. CHARLES ERICKSON

Rashidra Scott and Anthony Cochrane co-star in “My Lord, What a Night,” which George Street Playhouse is presenting at The New Brunswick Performing Arts Center.

“There comes a moment when you can’t keep quiet any longer,” says a character in Deborah Brevoort’s “My Lord, What a Night,” which The George Street Playhouse is currently presenting at The New Brunswick Performing Arts Center. But is this night in 1937 — April 16, to be exact — that moment for Marian Anderson?

In Brevoort’s based-on-real-events drama, the renowned African-American singer, then about 40, had come to Princeton to give a concert at The McCarter Theatre. The concert went well, but Anderson was denied a room at the hotel in which she thought she would be staying. Anderson was used to dealing with racist behavior in The South, but was surprised to encounter it in the supposedly enlightened town of Princeton.

Albert Einstein, then in his late 50s and teaching at Princeton’s Institute for Advanced Study, had attended the concert, and offered Anderson a room at his Princeton home. The play starts with the two arriving there.

“The people of Princeton are not enlightened … they are wealthy,” says the German-born Einstein, who had been living in Princeton for about two years at that point (having come to The United States, largely, to escape European antisemitism). “There is a difference. Unfortunately, your country makes the mistake of equating the two.”

T. CHARLES ERICKSON

Rashidra Scott in “My Lord, What a Night.”

Brevoort was originally commissioned to write “My Lord, What a Night” by Premiere Stages’ Liberty Live program at Kean University; the program’s mission is to develop plays about different aspects of New Jersey’s history. I reviewed it at Kean in 2016. It was a just a one-act play then; George Street Playhouse is presenting the greatly expanded two-act version, which premiered in West Virginia in 2019.

Brevoort had a great idea to zero in on this moment, as a way of exploring the messy but fascinating area where art, science and activism intersect. A significant portion of the conversation is devoted to historical scene-setting, which does make the play drag a little at times. But this is balanced by humor — much of it coming in the form of Einstein’s witticisms — and some emotional release during moments when Anderson’s prodigious musical talent is on display. The characters, even given their legendary status, are relatable. This is a great example of a play that tackles monumental issues in a complex way, but never feels daunting or dry.

Sheldon Epps directs, and Meghan Raham designed the set: the cluttered and imposingly book-lined living room of Einstein’s Princeton home. Rashidra Scott, who plays Anderson, and Anthony Cochrane, as Einstein, are joined in the cast by two other actors who play real but less well known people. Gayle Samuels portrays activist Mary Church Terrell, who co-founded the National Association of Colored Women; Mitch Greenberg is Abraham Flexner, who founded and ran The Institute for Advanced Study.

T. CHARLES ERICKSON

Anthony Cochrane in “My Lord, What a Night.”

Brevoort occasionally touches on the connections between music and science, as when Einstein says, “The great composers don’t create. They listen. And then they write down what they hear. The great scientists do the same thing.” And the way she has Anderson talk about musical inspiration suggests a parallel with quantum mechanics:

You can’t sing a song until you feel it. No matter how hard you try, the song cannot be grasped: When that happens, you just have to turn away. But then, sometimes, you’ll have a flash of understanding. That song that you’ve been unable to reach will suddenly become clear. In an instant, it’s yours. And you can sing it.

The first act deals with Anderson and Einstein deciding what, if anything, they are going to do about Anderson’s experience at the hotel. Should they take some kind of stand? Should they at least talk to the horde of journalists who are gathering outside Einstein’s house? Anderson is an artist and Einstein is a scientist, but they are both celebrities, too. They could bring attention to an injustice, and that could reverberate way beyond Princeton.

Anderson’s instinct is to keep quiet and stay focused on her music and her career; Einstein, more brash by nature, wants to speak his mind. Terrell wants to go as public as possible, while Flexner wants to sweep everything under the rug. (Both Terrell and Flexner are no strangers to discrimination themselves; Terrell as a Black woman from The South, and Flexner as a Jew).

T. CHARLES ERICKSON

From left, Mitch Greenberg, Gayle Samuels and Anthony Cochrane in “My Lord, What a Night.”

At first, Flexner seems like a heartless bureaucrat, but he becomes more sympathetic when he explains that he just wants to protect his beloved Institute for Advanced Study, and the important work it is doing.

Act 2 jumps two years into the future, with the same four gathered once again in Einstein’s house. Everything is on a larger scale now: The Daughters of the American Revolution’s decision to prevent Anderson from singing at Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C., has become a national news story, and Einstein has found out that his work as a scientist has led to the probability that a bomb of previously unimaginable power will be built, and used.

Once again, the conversation is weighty, but the emphasis is on four real people — bouncing around each other like electrons, or melodies — struggling to figure out how to do the right thing.

George Street Playhouse will present “My Lord, What a Night” at The New Brunswick Performing Arts Center through May 17. Visit georgestreetplayhouse.org.

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