I am playing
Jelly Roll Morton, arguably the originator of Jazz Music, at the
Theatre by the Lake in Keswick in May. The show is a fictionalisation of verbatim recordings made by Morton in 1938, written by the late
John Petherbridge. It brings together Morton and Radio presenter
Robert Ripley (Played by
Robert Blackwood) who is best remembered for his "Believe It Or Not" franchise.
In real life, Ripley introduced the world to
W. C. Handy on his programme, crediting him with the invention of jazz. Morton, furious, kicked up a fuss about it, wrote a 4000 word open letter to Ripley and made enough of a nuisance of himself that renowned musicologist, Alan Lomax invited him to do a series of recorded interviews for the Library of Congress which was compiling material for a record of American Music History.
These are a fascinating listen and a goldmine of personal memories of period of history that has taken on mythological stature.
Of course, there is no question that Jelly Roll was present at the birth of jazz and he was a very skilled musician, composer and entrepreneur. Nearly a century and a quarter has passed since and many have written more
incisively (and accurately) about it than I can.
It's interesting to be playing a real person. The responsibility is different. I once played
Elijah McCoy
who invented the self lubricating steam engine but that's a different story. In my comfort zone of fiction, one can ruthlessly invent and fabricate around a script.
It's a different prospect when you are recreating a person from living memory, particularly one who has been recorded so ubiquitously. Yet the performance must be more than an impersonation. We also have the job of placing these real people in their fictional setting, creating drama and pursuing character arcs and doing all the things that an actor must do to please an audience.
This may be one of my most challenging roles yet and I'm a little nervous. But as Woody Allen suggests, "That's why have rehearsal."
