![]() They didn’t see Tom Robinson as a tragic figure. Ordinarily, we’re playing to a mostly white, mostly affluent audience, but this was a very diverse one. Sorkin: It’s the only audience where most of the people have had no contact with “To Kill a Mockingbird,” so they’re experiencing the story for the first time. But it ended up being the most profound experience I’ve ever had in a theater. How could it not be? These kids were being let out of school on a Wednesday afternoon in a basketball arena. And right up until the moment that the lights came down, I was sure this was going to be a well-intentioned disaster. Sorkin: A couple of weeks before we had to shut down because of COVID, the Broadway company performed in front of 18,000 public school kids at Madison Square Garden. Q: Outside of reviews or sales receipts, how did you know this version was connecting with people before it went on the road? He ceases to be this kind of king figure, and is now more approachable and teachable. If it’s a loss-of-innocence story about children, it’s also loss of innocence story for Atticus. He’s given him a great sense of humor, thank God, and all of his apparently unassailable virtues are interrogated. And he did another thing, which is absolutely fantastic for theater audiences and actors who play Atticus: He took (Atticus) off his pedestal and brought him forward. Thomas: (Sorkin) wanted to take it out of the realm of the “white savior” story. It ended up sounding like the way I write, but with a Southern lilt. I couldn’t just do a Harper Lee impersonation, so I wrote it (in my voice). So it was like a greatest hits album done by a cover band. ![]() ![]() I tried to swallow the book in bubble wrap and gently transfer it to a stage without harming it. Sorkin: Well, my first draft was terrible. How do you put your stamp on something that’s been seen thousands of times on stage? Two separate phone interviews have been combined and edited here for clarity and length. We caught up with Sorkin, 61, and Thomas, 71, this week in advance of the Colorado shows presented by the Denver Center for the Performing Arts. But Sorkin and Sher have already moved on to adapting “Camelot,” giving local theatergoers a crack at seeing the touring version of “Mockingbird.” While it paused production in January 2022 with intentions to continue, the play won’t be returning to Broadway any time soon following its final performance on Jan. Since its 2018 debut, many critics and audiences have praised the production, directed by Bartlett Sher, for making the story about tragic, deadly racism in 1930s Alabama feel new again. Aaron Sorkin attends the premiere for “The First Lady” at the DGA Theater Complex in Los Angeles on April 14, 2022. 5 Denver shows from the touring Broadway production feature Emmy winner Richard Thomas (“Ozark,” “The Americans,” “The Waltons”) as fearless Southern lawyer Atticus Finch, with Oscar- and Golden Globe-winning writer Sorkin filtering Lee’s 1960 novel through his rapid-fire dialogue, humor and social consciousness. Saturday, June 17th 2023 Home Page Close MenuĪfter nine Tony nominations and a pandemic-induced paralysis, Aaron Sorkin’s new take on Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird” is striding into the Buell Theatre.
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