St. Louis Black Repertory Blues in the Night, A Musical Revue by Sheldon Epps

By Nancy Larson

A fading femme fatale, a woman of the world and a wide-eyed ingénue have one thing in common: a snake of a man who leaves them each with the blues.

Living in a rundown Chicago hotel, the trio sings and harmonizes together, but never actually lay eyes on one another. Separated by wallpapered panels, three adjacent boudoirs make up the set, with props like black and white photos, a vintage radio and a leather suitcase recreating the year 1938. When one sings, the others make up their faces, do their nails, drink wine or peruse an old scrapbook. A character known only as “the man,” played by Black Rep veteran J. Samuel Davis, sneaks around the set and croons about wild women and the innate flaws of the male species.

Though you can’t help but ache for these women, had the nameless man not done them wrong, they would have no reason to belt out the torch songs of Duke Ellington, Bessie Smith and others with a power that shakes the theatre like a thunderstorm.

Anita Jackson’s sultry rendition of “Buggy Ride” (“Honey, I like it when you pull that clutch … ) is a heated affirmation that the words don’t matter when the tone and the hip swings drip with suggestion. “I love the way he bastes my ham,” sings Jackson in her washed-up performer role, in a similarly raunchy rendition of “Kitchen Man.”
As the worldly one, Willena Vaughn shakes her stuff with an energy and vocals that rival Jackson’s in “Rough and Ready Man” and several other numbers. Though Black Rep regular Leah Stewart’s range, projection and ability to emote can’t begin to match up to either of the other women’s, the voice of her sweet-young-thing character blends well in their numbers together, and she shines on her own in “When Your Lover Has Gone.”

Near the end, all three women tell it like it is in “I Gotta Right to Sing the Blues.” A standing ovation let them know the audience could listen to them exercise that right just about any time they choose.