Review in Aurora: Paramount’s BOLD Series unfurls ‘What the Constitution Means to Me’

Paramount’s Copley Theatre BOLD Series production, “What the Constitution Means to Me,” couldn’t be more timely or hopeful. Written by Obie Award-winning actor Heidi Schreck, it is an honest, penetrating, very witty autobiography.

“What the Constitution Means to Me” enjoyed a five-month Broadway run that resulted in two 2019 Tony nominations for Best Play and Best Performance by an Actress; it also was a Pulitzer Prize for Drama finalist.

Director Lauren Berman may be making her Paramount directing debut, but she has 30 years’ directing experience in both professional and educational theater. And with the play’s dynamic and flowing pacing, the audience is at all times engaged with Berman’s magnifying-glass analysis of our Constitution. Neither she nor the actors stray from Schreck’s pronouncements of gender and racial biases and the impact of Supreme Court decisions.

The action is set in Wenatchee, Washington (the apple capital of the world), in a magnificent, realistic American Legion Hall designed by Angela Weber Miller, where we follow Schreck’s journey from a teen of 15 to a woman in her mid-40s, telling the stories of four generations of her family while she reflects on our nation’s founding document and women’s rights.

Schreck’s mother devised a plan for her to compete in giving speeches in American Legion halls throughout the United States to earn prize money for her college education (“all four years … thank you … OK, it was a state school”). Schreck compared the Constitution to “The Crucible,” a metaphor of a boiling pot; her chief competitor, Becky Lee Dobbins, compared the Constitution to a patchwork quilt. At 15, Schreck is enamored of the theater, the Salem witch trials, “Dirty Dancing” and, of course, Patrick Swayze. In preparing her autobiography, she has discovered that her mother threw out her prize-winning speech, forcing Schreck to recreate a version of the speech she gave over 30 years ago.

Not your typical play, “What the Constitution Means to Me” evolves in three uninterrupted segments: Schreck at age 15 asking the audience to be the typical American Legion audience (old white men smoking cigars), Schreck as a woman in her mid-40s telling the audience we can return to being ourselves, and a final parliamentary debate featuring a teen Heidi examining the Constitution and whether or not it should be rewritten. An audience member is randomly selected to decide on the winner of the debate, and we are encouraged to “passionately participate.” Spoiler alert and great touch: every audience member is given a pocket-sized copy of the U.S. Constitution to check facts.

In between these segments, you’ll learn much and hear the actual audiotapes of the 1965 Supreme Court Justices discussing contraception with lots of throat clearing; the 1983 Castle Rock v. Gonzales case decided in 2005 with a debate over the word “shall”; and the question put to Ruth Bader Ginsburg: “When will there be enough women on the Supreme Court?” and her superb reply: “When there are nine.”

There are only three actors in the cast of “What the Constitution Means to Me.” Chicago actor Cory Goodrich commands and engages the audience at all times as Schreck. She is a phenomenal talent who interacts through her fourth-wall-breaking addresses to the audience. Goodrich has an incredible amount of lines she flawlessly delivers, and is engaging, congenial and a masterful storyteller (never pedantic). She is rarely offstage – truly powerful and clearly emphatic with her insights into the Ninth and 14th Amendments. Goodrich also knows comedic timing.

Kevin McKillip delightfully portrays a strait-laced, straight-faced Legionnaire with exquisite posture, who sheds his crisp uniform to become Schreck’s real best friend Mike. There is a wonderful discussion of “positive male energy” under McKillip’s care. He is just superb.

Vivian Webb (in rotation with Lilly Fujioka) plays the teen Debater, and she is amazing – pure energy and determination in her debate face-off. In reality, Webb is a junior honors student at Metea Valley High School, who aspires to be a marine biologist, and has been acting since the age of 10. (No wonder!) She delivers her lines with ease and expressive facials.

After an applause-approved and welcomed Abraham Lincoln comment: “people should not throw out the Constitution, but the men who abuse it,” “What the Constitution Means to Me” ends on a hopeful note with Schreck’s pronouncement that teens and youth are “shining a light backwards so I can follow you into the future.” And I guarantee the Constitution will be more meaningful to you after you view this stellar production.

(The play runs one hour and 40 minutes, with no intermission, and includes mature language and adult topics.)

• Regina Belt-Daniels is a veteran director and actor, having worked with RCLPC, TownSquare Players, Woodstock Musical Theater, Raue Center For The Arts, Independent Players and The Black Box Theatre at McHenry County College. Currently involved with Elgin Theatre Company’s production of “It’s a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play,” she also enjoys writing theater reviews for Shaw Local News Network.

IF YOU GO

WHAT: “What the Constitution Means to Me”

WHERE: Copley Theatre, 8 E. Galena Blvd., Aurora

WHEN: Wednesday through Sunday until Nov. 12

COST: $40 to $55

INFORMATION: paramountaurora.com, 630-896-6666