Dance marathons are elements of our history most Americans would like to forget. In their heyday, they were hyped as a way for desperate Depression-era young people to stave off hunger, getting fed regularly while they danced for thousands of hours to entertain the masses.
In fact, the marathons were a kind of blood sport, allowing an audience to watch people wear themselves out, ruin their bodies, even go crazy chasing a little bit of cash — money that they usually didn’t get at the end anyway.
June Havoc’s “Marathon ’33” captures the true ugliness of those marathons, contrasting the dishonesty of the greedy organizers and their professional dancers with the neediness of the amateurs. And American Century Theater’s production of the show does not shy away from painting that ugliness in the extreme.
Director Jack Marshall has emphasized the brutality and humiliation that were at the core of marathons, adding abundant details to reproduce the authentic feel of the dances.
| Onstage |
| ‘Marathon 33’ |
| Where: American Century Theater, Gunston Theatre Two, 2700 South Lang St., Arlington |
| When: Through August 25 |
| Info: $27 to $35; 703-998-4555; americancentury.org |
At the head of the theater is a stage where the marathon’s sleazy promoter, Clyde Dankle (Craig Miller) and MC Ruddy Blaine (Bill Karukas) stand and direct the action. At the opposite end of the theater is a continually updated tally of how many hours the couples have danced.
Into this scene comes a young woman, June/Jean Reed (Jennifer Richter). She knows nothing of the marathon world, but she’s without work so she learns quickly how to last for hours on end, how to break every hour for fifteen minutes of sleep, how to eat standing up.
She has the bad fortune to partner with a suave cad, Patsy McCarthy (Bruce Alan Rauscher), who promises June a lot, even marriage, but in the end destroys her dreams.
Marshall has a lot of excellent actors in his cast, especially Richter and Jane Petkofsky, who plays a surrogate mother to the young dancers, and Alex Witherow, who dons roller skates and keeps the contestants in line.
Marshall deserves credit for making us remember the past. But Havoc was an actress, not a playwright, and her script contains flaws. After 2 hours and 45 minutes, “Marathon 33” begins to feel less like a credible play and more like the dramatic equivalent of a dance marathon.
