FFWD Weekly
Copyright © 1997. All Rights Reserved.
Hank Williams: The Show He Never Gave
Starring Dave Kelly
Alberta Theatre Projects, Martha Cohen Theatre
July 6 August 3By Lori Montgomery
In the context of a season that revolved around Angels in America, a Hank Williams tribute might not seem like a ground-breaking offering. A blatant Stampede tourist draw, you might think. Well, it is. But it happens to be a good show, too.
As the rowdy audience settles around the cabaret-style tables, giving cursory examination to the New Year's decorations, they might pause at the incongruity of it all. But then they flip through the program and realize that this is the concert that would have taken place if Williams hadn't died on his way to Canton, Ohio on New Year's Day, 1953. So they accept the seasonal time warp and settle down for a toe-tappin' good time watching a guy pretend to sing like ol' Hank.
But wait. Ol' Hank seems a bit unsteady on his feet. The audience shifts uncomfortably and realizes that he's drunk. But he soon warms up to the spotlight and starts cranking out those old hits, so the fans forgive him the rocky start and a few even begin to sing along. That gets to be a little tough when the country superstar forgets the words to a song. But he cracks a self-effacing joke or two about his love of a good stiff drink and they laugh sympathetically. He misses an intro and many in the audience laugh again. He jokes again about his drinking problem and it's less funny this time, but he still gets a laugh.
The party gets a bit more uncomfortable when Hank launches into a tormented monologue, but a few hardy souls laugh again, in case this is supposed to be funny.
By the time the show's over, a few still haven't grasped the point and they're still laughing - much like Hank's bemused New Year's 1953 audience might have done. But that only increases the sense of pathos for the rest of us, who have realized that this is much more than Stampede-time country karaoke. This is a snapshot of the first real country music superstar, whose personal demons - and a lethal combination of drugs and alcohol - killed him in the backseat of a car on the way to the show we just saw.
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