'The Bridges of Madison County' fizzles at the Forum Theatre
Despite a strong production, the musical is less romantic fantasy than it is cliched commentary on Midwestern existence. Performances continue through March 2.
Robert Kincaid, the romantic hero of “The Bridges of Madison County,” the musical on stage now at Wichita’s Forum Theatre, is of the breed of coastal artists with pronounced disdain for the American hinterlands. A Texas-born, Seattle-based photographer for National Geographic, Robert is spending a few days in rural Iowa on assignment to photograph a series of quaint covered bridges. He demonstrates his worldliness primarily through his culinary tastes: his stated willingness to eat homemade mozzarella with basil and tomato, his facility with a moka pot, his disdain for Iowa coffee. And, most tiresomely, through his ridicule of fat people.
Over the course of four days in the mid-1960s, Robert’s rambling life coincides with the cloistered world of Francesca Johnson, an Italian American war bride in a stultifying marriage. The unlikely pair quickly enter into a brief but intense dalliance.
If you were sentient in the early 1990s, you likely know this story. “The Bridges of Madison County” is based on a book of the same name that was adapted into a film starring Meryl Streep and Clint Eastwood. Authored by Robert James Waller, the romance novella was a sensation, hanging out on the New York Times best-seller list for more than three years despite its tepid critical reception.
Despite a few flubbed and stepped-on lines in the Forum’s first Sunday matinee, performances are generally strong across the board, typical of shows helmed by Kathy Page-Hauptman, who directed. As Francesca and Robert, Chelsey Ehresman and James Verderamo do their best with the material they have to work with. Ehresman nails the accent of an Italian woman whose lilt has been tempered by 18 years as a Midwestern farm wife. Both her hesitation and pull toward adventure are evident in her physicality. As Robert, Verderamo brings an easy, commanding presence to the stage, delivering his lines in the authoritative manner of an elitist globetrotter. Despite the actor’s easy grace and good looks, his character becomes less attractive over the course of the play given the lines he’s obligated to deliver. The pair manage to generate some heat by Act 2, even if it never fully ignites.
The slim nature of the novella’s narrative is evident in its musical adaptation. Interstitial scenes take us to the state fair in Indianapolis (where the rest of the Johnson family hope daughter Carolyn will win “steer of the year”) and backwards in time to learn about Robert's ex-wife and Francesca’s sister. These feel mostly like a means of padding the runtime.
Notable exceptions are the scenes featuring Jenny Mitchell and Alexander Ogburn as the Johnson's nearest neighbors Marge and Charlie. Through a fragment of her kitchen window, Marge spies on and speculates about what's happening in Francesca’s garden, her home, and maybe even her bed. When she delivers a lasagna and one of her signature desserts to the Johnson family upon their return from the fair, we understand that she’s being both nosy and neighborly. Marge’s naked curiosity and Charlie’s gentle spirit infuse the show with much-needed humor and humanity.
Ogburn and Mitchell also get the best two numbers: the gospel-inflected "When I'm Gone" and the torch song "Get Closer." I couldn't take my eyes off Mitchell while she belted from behind an old-fashioned microphone.
Except for these and two other period-inflected tunes, the musical numbers have the anodyne, repetitive qualities of bad contemporary worship music. A piano-heavy score is frequently dominated by the endless, exhausting swelling of strings.
Poor Robert and Francesca get the short end of the stick here. The musical's low points are their swoon-y, forgettable duets, which are frequently punctuated by wordless ah-a-ahs. But it would be unfair to bag on the music so hard without noting that Tony voters disagreed with this assessment: “Bridges” won best original score (music and/or lyrics) and best orchestrations at the 68th annual awards.
Costumes by Hauptman and props by Aaron Profit are largely well done, particularly Francesca's shirtwaist dresses and the period linens dressing the Iowa farmhouse tables. Ben Juhnke’s set is lovely and spare, with a paint-by-numbers-esque backdrop that shifts from sunset reds and pinks to predawn greens and blues thanks to effective lighting design by Melissa Legg. The only other permanent feature of the stage is a simple frame indicating the Johnsons' farmhouse. Other set pieces are wheeled on and off stage by cast members. These include Francesa's spare but well-appointed kitchen and a piece of her neighbor Marge's home. The walls of each are jagged, perhaps indicating the fragmentary nature of memory.
Oddly, the covered bridges Robert has traveled to Iowa to photograph are barely referenced and never described in a musical that carries their name. They are mostly represented in fragments of photographs pasted on the walls at the sides of the stage. As these are rarely lit, it took me some time to recognize what they were.
You can see how a Wichita company might choose to produce “Bridges.” Like Iowa's, the Kansas landscape is relatively featureless. ("Iowa is so flat, it feels like the only way to get out is to blast away in a rocket,” Francesca tells Robert.) We have our own minor architectural marvels and plenty of citizens who long for bigger, more exciting lives. Or at least a few days of wild indulgence to sustain ourselves for the rest of our boring middle-American existence.
Forgive me if I think Midwesterners — and audience members — deserve more.
The Details
The Forum Theatre presents “The Bridges of Madison County”
February 13-March 2, 2025, at the Wilke Center, 330 N. Broadway in Wichita
Performances take place at 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday and 2 p.m. on Sundays. With the intermission, the show runs about two hours and 40 minutes.
Tickets are $44; military and student discounts are available.
Visitor notes
The Wilke Center is located at the rear of First United Methodist Church in downtown Wichita. Enter the parking lot from Topeka Street.
The majority of the 135 seats in the house are large and well-padded. The best views are from the first, third, and fourth rows in the center. A handful of less comfortable wrought iron bar stools clustered around cocktail tables at the back of the theater may offer obstructed views, depending on the height of audience members in the fourth row. Accessible seating is available.
A concession stand in the lobby, which is open before the show and during intermission, offers Marge-worthy slices of cake and pie ($5.50), hot chocolate ($3), Spice Merchant coffee, and other beverages ($2).
Buy tickets for “The Bridges of Madison County.”
Emily Christensen is a freelance journalist and one of the co-founders of the SHOUT. She is a past fellow of the National Critics Institute at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center and a recipient of an Arts Writing Grant from The Andy Warhol Foundation.
⊛ Off-Broadway, a Kansas playwright meditates on the labor that defines us
⊛ Wayne Gottstine is 'back in the fight'
⊛ Star of MTW's 'Gypsy' finds purpose both on stage and from behind a pulpit
⊛ 'You don't have to give up': Clark Britton on making art into his 90s
⊛ Bygone Friends University museum housed curious collections
The latest from the SHOUT
Skyler Lovelace
Lori Brack
Sam Jack
Olivia D’Laine Schawe