QUALITIES OF LIFE: SCENE "Halloween all year long"
10/29/2006 Author(s): By Patrick Kampert, Tribune staff reporter
Living-history actors have to be convincing for audiences--and the occasional traffic cop
If Leslie Goddard wants to go to a Halloween party, all she has to do is wear her work clothes.
Like a number of Chicago-area history buffs, one of the ways she supports herself is by portraying famous people from the past. Whether the occasion calls for "Little Women" author Louisa May Alcott, Chicago socialite Bertha Palmer or Revolutionary War firebrand Abigail Adams, Goddard, with a BA in theater and a PhD in history from Northwestern, is all set. So is her closet.
But when the Elmhurst historian (lesliegoddard.net) was drafted to take her nieces trick-or-treating as Alcott a couple of years ago, she realized the effect wasn't quite what she intended.
"There's something almost freaky about it," she said with a laugh. "The outfits are less like costumes and more like clothes, so it's a little disconcerting to people."
Many adults, seeing her hoop skirt, bonnet, gloves and button-up boots, eyed her warily.
"I think they thought I was a little too into it," she said. "But I secretly think some of them were wishing that they were dressing up too."
Joan Schaeffer of Naperville used to dress as Laura Ingalls Wilder while handing out Halloween candy. A former teacher, she founded Historical Perspectives for Children (historicalperspectives.net), in which actors present one-person dramas about historical characters, using layers of costumes to play the likes of Wilder, Ben Franklin and Harriet Tubman from childhood to old age.
Before she expanded her home-based business to other cities, she often could be found traversing the expressways and doing four or more shows daily at local schools. Once, near Oak Park, she was traveling a little too fast and got pulled over by a police officer. She was still wearing what she called her "old lady makeup" but also Wilder's "little-girl dress and bloomers."
"He asked me to get out of the car," she said. "He looked at my license and said, 'Is this you?'"
Once her profession was explained, he let her go without a ticket. "I don't know if he was impressed or felt sorry for me--but the getup worked in that case."
A strong connection
But if their profession seems like a yearlong costume party to some people, most of these living-history performers are passionate about what they do and have a strong attachment to their particular character.
Environmentalist John Wallace drove 380 miles from his Carbondale home to the Severson Woods Nature Center in Rockford on a recent Saturday to present what he calls "The Gospel According to John Muir."
Stuffed birds hung from the rafters as he set up logs to resemble a campfire on the carpeting and gathered pine cones, acorns, branches and leaves from the nearby forest to add to the effect. Wallace effected a Scottish burr as he entertained guests who stumbled upon the campsite of the famed American conservationist and founder of the Sierra Club, who was born in Scotland and lived in the Midwest as a child.
Wallace has been performing as Muir since Earth Day 2000. "One day, I looked in the mirror and realized I was starting to look like the guy a little bit," he said.
He has spent two decades as an environmental educator. Originally, he was a landscaper with a degree in plant and social science. He would follow semis loaded with bulldozers to see where subdivisions were sprouting in hopes of getting work for his company. Then one day he saw the trucks head for a favorite forest where he used to retreat for serenity each day and decided he needed to think about doing something else.
"His words are in my heart," Wallace said emphatically of Muir. "I've never found another philosopher to be quite in sync with my beliefs."
Wallace's Muir conveys warmth and empathy, but Lyman Shepard of Oak Park knows those are not necessary qualities for an effective performance. In 22 years of transforming himself into fiery architect Frank Lloyd Wright, his character's arrogance and womanizing have polarized some audiences.
"You feel sorry for him, but you hate him for what he did. It's love and hate," said Shepard, a founding board member of the Frank Lloyd Wright Home and Studio in Oak Park. Shepard originally had to be talked into portraying Wright by the board chairman, who personally delivered a cape, the architect's trademark, to Shepard's house to make sure he wouldn't back out.
Now 84, he has brought Wright to life all over the world since retiring from a stock brokerage firm. Like Goddard and Wallace, some of his appearances come through the Illinois Humanities Council's Road Scholars Program (prairie.org), which provides programs statewide for various groups.
"I can get people who usually come to a meeting and are bored, fiddling with their tie, to pay attention," said Shepard, who has not let a heart attack years ago slow him down from the mercurial character with whom he feels a great kinship. His cardiologist lives in a Wright home, "so he has great understanding about why I'm doing this."
If portraying runaway slave and abolitionist Harriet Tubman (for Schaeffer's Historical Perspectives) began as simply a job for the twentysomething Chicago actress known simply as McKeel, it has become a passion.
"I really enjoy Harriet because she was so courageous," she said. "She sacrificed her life for the needs of others and put herself in danger day in and day out."
Schaeffer's script, covering the breadth of Tubman's life, is an emotional roller coaster, but DePauw graduate McKeel has reserves to draw from that few re-enactors do. Her father killed her mother when she was 3; McKeel says she and her brother witnessed the crime. Her grandmother took her in but soon became too sickly, and McKeel and her brother ended up in foster care for years.
"Your imagination does get big," she said, "because you pretend to be in another world just to get out of the one you're in."
Though some up-and-coming thespians would prefer storefront theater to the elementary school audiences McKeel encounters, she says she loves her young crowds.
"These kids are just honest," she said. "I'm looking at their faces and seeing their reactions. I'm hearing them say, 'Run, Harriet!' and 'Wake up!' I think kids are just a joy to perform in front of. And they'll let you know when you suck; they'll start falling asleep."
Abe at Home Depot
While McKeel is just starting out, Max and Donna Daniels of Wheaton are well-established nationally as two of the premier re-enactors of Abraham and Mary Lincoln.
Although many living-history performers can remain anonymous outside working hours, that's not usually possible for Max Daniels, who looks the part, beard and all.
"If you see him at Home Depot, you know that's Abraham Lincoln," noted fellow actor Goddard.
The Danielses average more than 200 appearances, and more than 30,000 miles on their Ford Explorer, each year.
"Once I get suited up, I can focus as Lincoln. And if you called my name, I probably wouldn't know who you were talking to at the moment," said Max.
They are part of the Association of Lincoln Presenters, a group of 150 Lincoln actors across the country. "It's like an Elvis convention with frock coats when we get together," cracked Max.
Lincoln had a great sense of humor, Max pointed out. "Secretary Seward would say, 'Mr. Lincoln, I do believe you would tell a humorous story within a mile of hell.' And Lincoln looked over and said, 'That's about how far it is to the Capitol.'"
So it was in that spirit that, after Civil War re-enactors started calling Max and Donna "Abe and the Babe," the Danielses thought it a smashing name for their Web site: abeandthebabe .com.
Donna Daniels says she and the other Mary Lincolns around the country try hard to humanize the former first lady, who was institutionalized for a time. She outlived three of her four children besides witnessing her husband's murder and did seem to have what today might be seen as bipolar disorder.
Suddenly, Max Daniels' giggling interrupts the sober discussion. He points to the T-shirt that Donna is wearing. It features an image of Mary Lincoln and these words:
"I'd have to be crazy to live in Springfield."
"We take the people we portray seriously," Donna explained with a smile, "but we don't take ourselves seriously."
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Copyright © 2006, Chicago Tribune
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