Midwest première of Kenneth Jones’ new play “Alabama Story.” Inspired by true events, it centers on Emily Wheelock Reed, a fearless librarian who fights a campaign to purge what becomes, during the course of the play, a controversial book from the state library. The book is “The Rabbit’s Wedding,” a picture book aimed towards children aged 3 to 7, illustrated by Garth Williams (best known for his illustrations of “Little House on the Prairie” and “Charlotte’s Web”). The book tells the sweet story of two little rabbits who lived ‘happily ever after’ in the friendly forest. However, one rabbit is white and the other black and we are in 1959 Montgomery, Alabama. “Alabama Story” was a 2014 finalist for the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center’s National Playwrights Conference.
The play pits Senator E.W. Higgins, a bullying segregationist, against the redoubtable Emily Wheelock Reed – incredible opposites and incredible forces – and puts both of their worlds at risk, though they are both tied by a love of books. While they spar, a parallel story of childhood friends, Joshua and Lily, a black man and a white woman reunited in adulthood, reflects the personal and political tensions swirling in Montgomery.
