Ingalls family is on the movie again

So the musical Little House on the Prairie didn't quite make it to Broadway after its premiere last fall at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis but at least it's coming to the tri-state area. New Jersey's close, right?

A national tour has been booked through June 2010 and these are the venues I've seen announced so far:

Paper Mill Playhouse in Milburn, N.J., from Sept. 10 to Oct. 10.
Ordway Center for the Performing Arts, in St. Paul, Minn., from Oct. 13-25 (official launch of the tour)
Denver Center for the Performing Arts, from Dec. 15-27

The show is coming to Toronto in early 2010 but no dates or location have been announced yet.

Melissa Gilbert will reprise her role as Caroline "Ma" Ingalls but I don't know whether any of the other Guthrie cast members are joining her. According to the Minneapolis Star Tribune, the musical, which didn't get great reviews but played to sellout audiences, has reportedly been "tweaked and re-designed."

(Update from Playbill: Steve Blanchard will continue as Pa and Kara Lindsay will reprise her role as Laura. Also, a few more cities have been announced, including Houston, Tempe, Ariz., and Sacramento, Calif., but no dates have been set.)

Personally, I thought the musical was kind of a mixed bag - some elements I liked, some I didn't. Maybe part of the appeal was being with friends and making my first visit to Minneapolis, but overall I enjoyed it. And I'm hoping the tour means there'll be a cast recording.

I think this is the kind of show that would do well on the road. It's got a "name" in the cast, the Little House books and television show are so familiar and it'll appeal to all ages. It's a great musical for children or adults who've read Laura Ingalls Wilder's series about life on the prairie in the 19th century.

Sure, I'm a little sad that it wasn't up to Broadway quality but on the bright side, it has the potential to draw a young audience. The more positive experiences you can provide to kids, the greater the chance that they'll grow up to be adult theatergoers. At least I hope so.

Little House on the Prairie

Gratuitous Violins rating: *** out of ****

Although I'm a pretty emotional person, there have only been a few times over the past 18 months when something in a play or musical has reduced me to tears. Well, it happened again one week ago today, when I saw the new musical Little House on the Prairie at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis.

There's a point near the end of Act I, after a bout of scarlet fever has left Mary Ingalls blind, when her younger sister Laura sings to her, "I'll be your eyes." It's such a moving scene, a beautiful duet between Kara Lindsay's Laura and Jenn Gambatese's Mary. For me, it was the most memorable part of lyricist Donna Di Novelli and composer Rachel Portman's score, and I was crying pretty much through the whole song.

In fact, it was so powerful, I was certain that "I'll be your eyes" would mark the end of Act I. But the show went on for what seemed like another half hour. As the mood on the McGuire Proscenium Stage became a more lighthearted one, I think some of the impact of that moment passed by a bit too quickly.

That kind of jarring transition sums up how I felt about Little House on the Prairie - there was lots to like, some truly soaring moments and terrific performances. But at the same time, there were a few things about the musical that just struck me as well, a bit out of place. (Although it's been awhile since I've read all the books so for all I know, they may be true to life.)

Beginning in 1932 with Little House in the Big Woods, Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote nine books about her childhood, describing her family's travels across the Midwest, what it was like to be a girl in the 1870s and 1880s, her career as a schoolteacher and her marriage to Almanzo Wilder.

The musical covers roughly the events of the middle books, beginning with By the Shores of Silver Lake, when Charles and Caroline Ingalls and their four daughters, including 12-year-old Laura, leave Walnut Grove, Minnesota, for a homestead in the Dakota Territory.

In adapting the work for the stage, book writer Rachel Sheinkin has tinkered a bit with the specifics of Wilder's life. For example, in the books, Mary is stricken with scarlet fever and becomes blind in Minnesota, before the family travels to the Dakotas. And there are only three Ingalls girls in the musical: Mary, Laura and Carrie. Baby Grace has been written out entirely.

Now, I loved Sheinkin's previous book of a musical, for The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. Sheinkin, who won a Tony award, created a wonderful, quirky, distinct group of adolescents. Their stories were funny and moving and they seemed very true to life. So I was really curious to see how she would approach a group of 19th century adolescents.

In Little House on the Prairie, I don't think she's always successful in capturing the essence of Laura's character. Some things just struck me as out of place, a little too 21st century. While some of the dialog was taken right from the books, other lines seemed a little too modern. I think Sheinkin stumbles a bit in trying to capture a 19th-century sensibility.

For example, there's a scene in a schoolhouse when Laura's nemesis Nellie Oleson, a suitably snobbish Sara Jean Ford, makes fun of the Ingalls girls because they're barefoot and they don't have the proper slates to write on. Coming to her sister Carrie's defense, Laura acts up in a way that was so disruptive, it didn't quite seem believable.

First, I simply don't believe that Caroline Ingalls, who, after all, had been a teacher, would have sent her daughters to school without shoes and without the proper supplies. While Laura was high-spirited and headstrong at times, she was at heart a good girl, well brought up, and would never have been that obnoxious and bratty to an authority figure like a teacher.

There's another song, where the homesteaders, going through a difficult winter, sing "Uncle Sam, Where are you?" While I'm glad that the musical doesn't sugarcoat things, I just don't believe that 19th century homesteaders expected a government bailout.

But despite those qualms, there are lots of things Little House on the Prairie, directed by Francesca Zambello, does right - including depicting the harshness and deprivation and isolation of life in the Dakota Territory.

There's a scene in the beginning of the musical when all of the wagons are filled with pioneers heading west, aided by Adrianne Lobel's imaginative set design. You get a great sense of who they were, how they came from different backgrounds - the wagon train includes European immigrants and African-Americans - but they set off with the same great hopes and dreams. (I did chuckle, though, at a bit of Michele Lynch's choreography in that scene that reminded me of Fiddler on the Roof.)

And Kara Lindsay is so appealing, with a strong, soaring voice. Her Laura is spunky and daring, with an independent streak. I especially loved Lindsay's performance in Act II. At that point, the pigtails are gone and she's transformed into a young woman who becomes a teacher in an even more isolated town, to earn money to help send Mary to a college for the blind.

Even though she's grown up, with more adult responsibilities, Laura is still feisty, still a risk-taker, still an independent-minded person right up until the end of the musical. We see her at first rebuffing and then falling in love with Almanzo, played by a very boyish and charming and confident Kevin Massey. I liked the scene between the two of them in Almanzo's wagon, when Laura takes over the reins and wants to drive the horses as fast as they can go.

The rest of the cast is great, too. Maeve Moynihan is sweet as Carrie, Gambatese's more mature and focused Mary provides a nice counterpoint to Laura's impetuousness in Act I. And I loved Steve Blanchard's strong, forceful Pa. You can definitely tell that Laura gets some of her spunk from him. As Ma, I thought Melissa Gilbert hit the right tone but didn't have quite the same presence as some of the other performers, and her voice seemed a bit thin in her big song, "Wild Child." Still, like everyone else, I remember watching her as television's absolutely adorable Laura, aka "half-pint," and it was very cool to see her on stage.

Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote her books to preserve the stories of her childhood, to show succeeding generations how much America had changed in her lifetime. And the musical does a good job of portraying what the lives of those pioneers were like. But what had the most impact on me were the things that are timeless - Laura's adventurous spirit and independence, her devotion to her family and to a sibling who needed her.

Revisiting Little House on the Prairie

I haven't read any of Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House on the Prairie books since I was, well, little. So, in tandem with my upcoming trip to the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis to see the new Little House on the Prairie musical, I thought it was time for a look back.

I was going to tackle the three middle books, because that's roughly the time period that the musical's plot covers. Unfortunately, I've only had a chance to read one, By the Shores of Silver Lake. Published in 1939, it's the fifth out of the nine books in the Little House series. The story takes place in 1879 and 1880, as the Ingalls family moves from Walnut Grove, Minnesota, to the wide open spaces of the Dakota Territory, lured by the government's promise of free land.

I'm sure one of the things that appealed to me when I first read the Little House books was that the stories were about girls my age living such an unimaginably different life. But in returning to the series, I realized that I'd forgotten some of the ways in which that life was most different.

For example, while Charles Ingalls goes on ahead of his family, Caroline and the girls - Mary, Laura, Carrie and baby Grace - travel part of the way by train. It's the children's first train ride and I'd forgotten about what a frightening experience it was for 12-year-old Laura. "Trains went faster than horses can run. They went so terribly fast that often they were wrecked. You never knew what might happen to you on a train."

The story opens just after Mary has been blinded by scarlet fever, so Laura explains in detail what they're seeing during the journey. Her descriptions are incredibly beautiful and evocative. They travel the rest of the way by wagon to the railroad camp at Silver Lake, where Charles Ingalls is working. The land in front of them is so vast, it barely seems like they're moving at all. "The farther they went into the West, the smaller they seemed, and the less they seemed to be going anywhere."

I'm sure the near-poetry of the language was lost on me the first time I read it, but this time, it made an impression. You really get a sense of the wide open spaces in Laura Ingalls Wilder's description of "the endless waves of flowery grass" and "the enormous stillness that made you feel still. And when you were still, you could feel great stillness coming closer."

Another part of the story that really struck me was the violence. There's drunken carousing and fighting and killing. When I read all of the Little House books as a kid, and I don't remember them being particularly violent. Maybe I just glossed over that stuff, but it was a little shocking. You definitely get a sense of the lawlessness of the Dakotas in the 1880s.

Charles is the storekeeper at the Silver Lake camp, and part of his job is to pay the railroad workers. At one point, the workers riot because they're only getting paid for two weeks instead of a whole month, and a paymaster, who brings the money, is nearly killed. Later, a homesteader is shot and killed by a claim jumper. Throw in a few curse words and some scenes would be right at home in the HBO series Deadwood, which also takes place in the Dakotas during roughly the same time.

By the end of the book, Charles Ingalls stakes his claim to 160 acres of land under the Homestead Act. The chapter describing the frenzy at the land office is pretty interesting. There are a couple of hundred men pushing and shoving while they wait for the office to open. He literally fights his way into the office to claim a particular parcel before another homesteader, who also had his eye on it, gets a chance.

If you go to the Web site for the Ingalls homestead in De Smet, South Dakota, you can actually see Charles Ingalls' land records from The National Archives. It's very cool. I wish that had been available when I was a kid.

Reading By the Shores of Silver Lake, I wondered what would make a man like Charles Ingalls bring his family from Minnesota to such uncharted and dangerous territory. What was it that made the pioneers who settled the West constantly look for even more wide open and unpopulated spaces?

Today, you're almost shocked that anyone would subject their family, young children, including a daughter who'd just been blinded, to this harsh life. The first winter, before they stake their claim, they're living in the relative comfort of the surveyor's house. But all of the railroad workers have left. Their closest neighbor is 60 mile away. If someone got sick or hurt, there's no way they'd be able to get to a doctor.

But I guess that's my 21st-century adult sensibility speaking. As a kid, I probably thought it was all very fascinating and adventurous. I'm glad I reacquainted myself with the Little House books. It was great to return to a series that I loved reading as a child. Now, I'm looking forward to seeing the story unfold on stage.

One month to go

One month from today I'll be in Minneapolis, sitting in the audience at the Guthrie Theater's McGuire Proscenium watching the new musical Little House on the Prairie!

So with previews in full swing, and the Aug. 15 opening night a little more than a week away, it's time to catch up on a little Little House news.

Graydon Royce, theatre critic for the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, has an interesting story about the show and its prospects after the Guthrie run, which has already been extended by two weeks - to Oct. 19. In the story, producer Ben Sprecher cautions that there are no official plans to take the musical to Broadway. Still, he doesn't rule out the possibility. "The show's got to be correct. It is very much a work-in-progress, and we hope we get it right at the Guthrie."

And Philip Boroff of Bloomberg News speaks to Adrianne Lobel, who conceived of the musical and designed the sets. Lobel was producer and set designer for A Year with Frog and Toad, based on the children's books written and illustrated by her father, Arnold Lobel.

As a child vacationing in Vermont during the summer she'd build houses out of sticks, imagining herself living on the prairie like Laura Ingalls. "What I love about the books is the power of autobiography,'' Lobel said. "That little girl made all her family immortal. Mary's blindness started Laura on that path. She had to describe things to her sister, which helped her remember them.''

Ticket sales on the first day broke a box office record for the Guthrie, and the theatre isn't the only place that's getting a boost. The musical has also sparked interest in visits to the Laura Ingalls Wilder Museum in Walnut Grove, Minnesota, according to director Amy Ankrum. "The books are still very popular, and when they hear that name (Little House), they think of the books as well, and it brings to mind the TV series."

Apparently I'll be in very good company on Sept. 6. In addition to my two excellent theatergoing companions, there'll be a contingent from Walnut Grove. The Walnut Grove group will be getting a backstage tour and hopefully a meeting with Melissa Gilbert, who plays Caroline Ingalls to Kara Lindsay's Laura. "I'll be on the bus that day, I gotta go," said museum board president Mary Jo Hendrickson. "It's a special event. It's important."

Also, check out the blog Only Laura, a great meeting place for fans of Little House on the Prairie. Blogger Sandra Hume edits The Homesteader, a newsletter about author Laura Ingalls Wilder that comes out twice a year.

Finally, you should stay away from these next two sites if you want to remain absolutely spoiler-free. (I'll admit, I'm a hopeless information junkie. I couldn't resist looking at either one of them.)

At Besides the Obvious, a Minneapolis blogger named Erika has a very detailed and thoughtful review of the musical. And, if you want to see what the show looks like on stage, Playbill has lots of photos of the entire cast, including Gilbert, Lindsay, Steven Blanchard as Pa; Jenn Gambatese as Mary, Sara Jean Ford as Nellie, and Kevin Massey as Almanzo Wilder.

Tickets for Little House on the Prairie are priced from $29 to $75, and are available by calling (612) 377-2224 or (877) 44-STAGE or by visiting the Guthrie Web site.

A little sneak preview

The Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis held a sneak preview yesterday for the new musical based on Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House on the Prairie books. Steve on Broadway was there and as usual provides an excellent firsthand account.

Also, you can hear from director Francesca Zambello and get a taste of three songs from the show in a short video clip on the Guthrie's web site.

In an interview with the Associated Press, Zambello said that the musical will take place in the 1880s and focus on a teenage Laura. The story will open in western Minnesota, then move to South Dakota, where the Ingalls family relocated to file a land claim. "They were constantly moving," Zambello said. "They were poor, poor people, constantly in search of land that would yield them something."

Casting for the show will be announced in April, according to a story by Dominic Papatola in the St. Paul Pioneer Press. Previews start on July 26, with opening night on Aug. 15. The musical runs through Oct. 5.

And while there's no specific mention of a Broadway run, Papatola says the Guthrie is working with a team of commercial producers led by Ben Sprecher, who most recently helped bring A Moon for the Misbegotten to Broadway last spring. Coincidentally, Moon was my first-ever Broadway show.

The Little House books were some of my favorites from childhood, so I'm looking forward to my first-ever trip to Minnesota this fall, when I'll take in the tuner with my two very wholesome, theater-loving Midwestern friends.

The Wild(er) West

I can't say I've ever spent a lot of time in the Midwest. I once spent a weekend in the suburbs of Detroit, and I was in Columbus, Ohio, for a day on a job interview. I'm not even sure if those two count. (And I was at the airport in Chicago once, but hey, I know airports don't count!)

Still, I've always had an interest in the region - and the pioneers who settled the frontier in the 19th century. As a kid, I loved Laura Ingalls Wilder's "Little House on the Prairie" and its sequels that portrayed life in Wisconsin, Minnesota, the Dakotas, Iowa, Kansas and Missouri.

Even though it was a setting far removed from my 20th century East Coast urban childhood, I found something appealing in the stories of a family's harsh life on the frontier in the 19th century. I'm not sure what the attraction was. I've always been a big American history buff. And part of it, I'm sure, was that kids like to read books about kids their own age having experiences that they could never imagine. (And I've often felt that some of the best books I've ever read are the ones I read growing up).

So I was excited to read that next summer, the Guthrie Theatre in Minneapolis will stage the world premiere of a musical based on the series. Guthrie director Joe Dowling says that Wilder's work has a "deep and powerful connection to the people of the Midwest."

Rachel Sheinkin, who won a Tony award for "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee," is writing the book for the musical. Coincidentally, I'm seeing "Putnam County" on tour this weekend, so I'll get a firsthand taste of Ms. Sheinkin's talents.

Also coincidentally, Jonathan Yardley, a book critic for The Washington Post, has penned a very interesting essay this week on rereading the Little House books.

Yardley discusses the extent to which Rose Wilder Lane, Wilder's daughter, helped her write the books. The conventional view is that the stories are Wilder's, but that Lane helped her mother by polishing the work into a publishable form.

He praises Wilder for portraying "vividly and accurately" the hardships of frontier life. "She was uncommonly observant; nothing seems to have escaped her." He adds that the books also do a good job of demonstrating the vital role women played in settling the West. The female characters "are thoroughly feminine, but they also know how to load guns and do chores in and out of the house. Indeed, the chief trouble with the Laura Ingalls Wilder industry as it now exists is that it idealizes the girls of the frontier far more than Wilder did."

(And make no mistake about it, there is a Wilder industry. In addition to the books, there are Wilder museums and historic sites in Minnesota, Missouri, Iowa, South Dakota, and places I'm probably leaving off. The long-running television series starring Michael Landon and Melissa Gilbert debuted in 1974 and ran until 1983, and there was a 2005 miniseries.)

Francesca Zambello, who will direct the latest incarnation of the Wilder stories, says that "Reading of the exuberance of these characters as they encountered the immense power and force of the Prairie speaks to our history as a country and a people. It did in the 1880s and it does now. Our musical focuses on the independent spirit of the teenager, Laura Ingalls Wilder, and her struggles to become an adult; along side the story of the land — as it becomes the American West."

It sounds promising. I'm just hoping that the musical won't settle for sweet sentimentality but will portray the harder-edged reality of life as Laura Ingalls Wilder and her family really experienced it while trying to settle a harsh, often unforgiving land.