The Franco family members (clockwise from top left, Erika Rolfsrud, Kleo Mitrokostas, Martin Ortiz and Kristoffer Cusick) try to bond while en route to the West Coast in The Greatest Hits Down Route 66.
Histories come in all shapes and sizes and can be chronicled in any number of fashions. Family histories, each unhappy in their own way, may reveal personal pains that turn out to be strikingly universal. A country’s history can be told in terms of its politics, its geographic landmarks, its immigrants. And a people’s history can be reflected in its folk music. Any one of these might make for an engrossing night of theater. But when attempting to combine all three, finding the right balance and weaving a cohesive tale become a tall order. Such is the case with the New Light Theater Project’s production of The Greatest Hits Down Route 66, which finds itself short on songs, long on family dysfunction, and scattered on Americana.
Vocalist Hannah-Kathryn “HK” Wall sings a folk classic as the Narrator (Joél Acosta) looks on. Photographs by Hunter Canning.
Under the direction of Sarah Norris and loosely based on a road trip that the playwright, Michael Aguirre, once took with his own father, the play recounts the 1999 family vacation of the Franco family, who set out from their suburban Chicago home to follow the historic Route 66 to the Pacific, adhering to an exacting itinerary of 117 stops assembled by a former military, right-leaning, controlling Dad of Hispanic descent, who goes by the name of Wolf Man (Kristoffer Cusick). Road trips, he explains, hark back to a post–World War II time when “everyone looked at their father with respect and dignity, as a national hero.” He is called Wolf Man, we come to learn, because as a child, he would protect his siblings while their mother was out of the house. “Like Lon Chaney,” she had said, “you turn into the Wolf Man and protect everyone while I’m gone.” That is possibly the most generous interpretation of Lon Chaney Jr.’s film character ever suggested.
Aguirre insists on referring to the other family members as archetypes, making them less sympathetic than they deserve to be. Wolf Man’s wife is Mother Dearest (Erika Rolfsrud). Not to be confused with Joan Crawford (Mommie Dearest), this “eternal optimist” is a good mother who shuns the spotlight and binds the family together. Rolfsrud brings a generous spirit and depth to what could have been a one-note role. Wee One, supposedly an 8-year-old boy, is portrayed by Kleo Mitrokostas, an actor in her 20s, and seems preternaturally bright, if still working on his proper diction. He also has the annoying habit of repeating every curse word he hears. The Eldest, who is Wee One’s 17-year-old brother, is portrayed with proper angsty despair by Martin Ortiz. As the family makes stops at locales like Lincoln’s Tomb and St. Louis’s Gateway Arch, frustrations build between Wolf Man and The Eldest. They argue over their Mexican heritage, the condition of the country, and, brutally, the role of race:
The Eldest:You want me to be a good, obedient little White boy with a good education—
Wolf Man: You. Are. White.
The Eldest: No. I’m. Not.
Wolf Man: You want to be White.
The Eldest: I don’t.
Wolf Man: You want people to trust you? Be White. You want someone to consider you for a good job, take you seriously? You want a nice house in a nice neighborhood? Be White.
The Eldest (Ortiz, left) and Wee One (Mitrokostas) face their frustrated father, Wolf Man (Cusick).
Stop number 30 on the trip itinerary is a visit to Wolf Man’s estranged father, who is living out his last days in Texas, financially supported by the Wolf Man’s wealthy brother. Wolf Man had clearly been dreading the visit, but a small epiphany occurs, easing even the tension between him and his own son and leaving the remainder of the trip, including the return drive, to be only summarily commented upon and completed without incident.
As counterpoint to this storyline, Aguirre seeds the play with song selections culled from Carl Sandburg’s 1927 comprehensive anthology of folk music, The American Songbag. Using only 10 of the collection’s 277 pieces of music, the excellent lead vocalist Hannah-Kathryn “HK” Wall and the play’s strangely intertwined and sometimes singing narrator, Joél Acosta, make the most of the short works, which often, and detrimentally, are interrupted with dialogue. Backed by a three-member ensemble (with the percussionist working from a plexiglass cage), highlights include “The John B. Sails,” which gets the vacation under way and which Beach Boys fans will recognize as source material for their 1968 hit “Sloop John B”; and a rendition of “Down in the Valley” that serenades a tender moment between husband and wife with a refrain of, “Throw your arms ’round me, give my heart ease.” In these rare moments song and scene enhance each other, and the road trip takes flight.
The Greatest Hits Down Route 66 runs through Feb. 18 at 59E59 Theaters (59 E. 59th St.). Evening performances are at 7 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday; matinees are at 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. For tickets and more information, call 646-892-7999 or visit 59e59.org.
Book: Michael Aguirre
Music Arrangements: Grace Yukich & Jennifer C. Dauphinais
Direction: Sarah Norris
Sets and Projections: Anna Kiraly
Costumes: Kara Branch
Lighting: Nic Vincent
Sound: Kwamina “Binnie” Biney
