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| Clifford (Terrance Austin Smith, left), Tony (Michael Champlin) and Louise (Roneet Aliza Rahamim) confer about the LBJ ad. (Tracy Martin photo) |
The events in Sean
Devine’s “Daisy” happened some six decades ago, but the play presented by
Hillbarn Theatre & Conservatory is timely and scary.
The title refers to an ad
that ran once in 1964, when President Lyndon Johnson was running against
conservative Republican Barry Goldwater of Arizona.
It shows a little girl
counting the petals she removes from the daisy she holds. As she counts up from
one, a male voice begins counting down from 10. When he reaches one, there’s a
nuclear explosion.
It ends with the male
voice saying, “The stakes are too high. Vote for President Johnson on Nov. 3.”
Although the ad was pulled
immediately, it set the stage for negative presidential campaigns through 2024.
The action focuses on
three writers for the Doyle Dane Bernbach ad agency. Their boss, Bill Bernbach
(Glenn Havlan), has assigned them to create the TV ad campaign for Johnson.
As required by Clifford
Lewis (Terrance Austin Smith), White House special counsel, they all must be
Democrats.
A major player for them
is Tony Schwartz (Michael Champlin), a sound theorist who records sounds of all
kinds and files them in his basement studio. He’s brilliant, but he’s also
agoraphobic, so he doesn’t want to venture any farther than four blocks from
his home or be any higher than four stories up.
Perhaps the central
character is Louise Brown (Roneet Aliza Rahamim), the only woman on the ad
team. She embodies some of the moral dilemmas posed by running the ad.
Her two colleagues, Aaron
Ehrlich (Keenan Murphy Flagg) and Sid Myers (George Psarras), get into
sometimes heated discussions with her.
The acting is topnotch
all around, with kudos especially going to Champlin as Tony, Smith as Clifford
and Havlan as Bill.
Although the play is
talky, director Jeffrey Bracco deftly guides his cast and keeps the action
flowing smoothly.
He’s aided by Hillbarn
artistic director Steve Muterspaugh’s set, which depicts Tony’s studio on one
side, the ad agency office in the center and Clifford’s White House office on
the other side.
He also is responsible
for the projections featuring newsreel footage from the time: the beginnings of
the Vietnam War, racial unrest and political events, among others.
Also instrumental in the
production are the costumes by Lyre Alston, sound by Jeff Mockus and lighting
by Pamila Gray.
Running about two hours
and 15 minutes with an intermission, the timely “Daisy” will run only through
Feb. 9 at Hillbarn Theatre, 1285 E. Hillsdale Blvd., Foster City.
For tickets and
information, call (650) 349-6411. Ext. 2, or visit www.hillbarntheatre.org.
