Mike Petee’s play, “With Pen in Hand” takes Dan Emmett where no historian has gone before. Most of us around here know Dan Emmett wrote the song usually known as “Dixie,” and that Mount Vernon holds a festival each year in Emmett’s honor. But that’s about as far as it goes. More’s the pity, because Emmett led a long and interesting life; a life many lads of his day only dreamed about.
Petee’s play takes us through those years in an entertaining and informative journey.
The play centers around a young woman reporter for the Mount Vernon Republican on her very first assignment — to interview Dan Emmett and make him out to be a racist, something Emmett was not. It is 1896 and Dan Emmett has just completed his last tour. The reporter, Silvia Davenport, played with an almost painful innocence by Allison Mills, gets an interview with Emmett, played by Carl Young, and his wife, Mary Louise Emmett, played by Dorothy Michalski.
Emmett was known to have detested reporters, having been one himself. Davenport is almost terrified to approach this famous man and has no real idea how to carry out her assignment to portray Emmett in a derogatory light. Both wind up charming each other, and the interplay between the world-wise entertainer and the innocent young girl/reporter is one of the charms of the play. Emmett has toured all over America as well as a short stint in Europe. Davenport admits to having traveled all over Knox County, and even visited Mansfield once.
As the interview progresses, Emmett’s story is told in the form of flashbacks, as the old Dan Emmett reflects on his life. The flashbacks also give an excuse for musical numbers.
There are more than a few surprises along the way, and the play gives more than a little dimension to someone most people know only as the author of an old song and a couple of extant photos of Emmett.
Petee has done a lot of homework on Emmett and manages to cram a lot of information into a very entertaining package.
Mark Jordan’s direction is right on the money. The play moves along at a comfortable clip and the performances are nothing less than outstanding.
Especially good performances come from Young as the “old” Uncle Dan, and Mills’ performance as the innocent reporter. Another outstanding bit, and one that really stops the show, is Doug Gustafson’s wacky and eccentric bit as a woman stump speaker lecturing about women’s rights. Gustafson does it in drag, complete with full period dress, a wig and his own beard. This by itself would make the play worth the price of a ticket.
Petee has been careful in crafting the play to be sensitive to issues that today are controversial. The minstrel players in the flashbacks do not use blackface or use the so-called Negro dialect popular at that time. The musical numbers are sharp and well performed. The show is entertaining, informative, and good, clean, wholesome fun appropriate for the whole family.
There will be four performances; evening performances tonight, Friday and Saturday nights at ThePlace@TheWoodward, 111 S. Main St. There will be a matinee performance Sunday. The Thursday, Friday and Saturday performances begin at 7 p.m.; the Sunday matinee is at 2 p.m.
Tickets are available at Sips or the Knox County Visitors Bureau.
