Arena Stage presents a one-woman production that offers just what it says it will offer: “A Long and Winding Road,” tracing Maureen McGovern’s life from the time she was a youngster in Youngstown, Ohio, through the days when she worked as a secretary by day and sang folk songs at night, through the highs and lows of her career.
The stage for this production is almost bare: grand piano, black leather lounge chair, stool, large screen on which are projected slides of McGovern as a young girl, at her confirmation, at a birthday party.
But the photos are not in sequential order. They follow the intriguing, rambling story line conceived by McGovern and Philip Himberg, which gives not just the outlines of a life but the story of how that life was affected by social and political voices and events.
To that end, there are other photos: of Martin Luther King, the March on Washington, a newspaper declaring that the Supreme Court had struck down segregation. But McGovern is not there to give an exhaustive history lesson. She has chosen to remind us of all the great singer-songwriters who influenced her: Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan, Carole King, Paul Simon, John Lennon, Paul McCartney and James Taylor, to name a few.
Several things work together to make this production a success. First, McGovern’s powerful voice, which belts out one song, then gently croons the next. Second, her extraordinary stylistic range allows her to do everything convincingly — from Weill to Tom Lehrer.
Finally, she has an uncanny ability to create, through song, the feeling of several past decades, emphasizing the silliness of the introductory bars of so many songs from the 1960s, the hip/cool attitudes of the 1970s and the blasé feel of the 1980s.
Even though the subject of this evening is McGovern’s own long and winding road, she deftly manages to turn it into a tribute to all those who had an effect on her life, suggesting the way music and lyrics can simultaneously create and embody the mood of an era.
If you go
“A Long and Winding Road,” with Maureen McGovern
Where: Arena Stage, 1800 S. Bell St., Arlington
When: 8 p.m. Thursday to Saturday (7:30 p.m. April 8), 2 p.m. Saturday, 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. Sunday; through April 12
Info: $25 to $45; 202-489-3300; arenastage.org
