Roston and Thomas Rock in Latest Rep Show

Milwaukee Repertory Theater presents Marie and Rosetta in the Stiemke Studio, October 22 – December 15, 2024. Pictured: Alexis J Roston, Bethany Thomas. Photo by Michael Brosilow.

Alexis J. Roston and Bethany Thomas.

Their very names are enough to justify dashing to the Milwaukee Repertory Theater’s Stiemke Studio stage, even if wondering why Marie and Rosetta was in the Stiemke in the first place rather than the Stackner Cabaret.

Perhaps because without such powerful voices dwelling on how spiritual, gospel, folk songs and blues converged into America and Britain’s electric rock, no one would go.

But Marie and Rosetta actually has a dramatic cover story, fetching to those interested in how our pop music was created. The storyline suggests we’re going to get inside the people as well as the music.

It is set decades ago amid the new-looking, but still creepy, caskets and piano of a Mississippi funeral parlor, where touring black performers could refresh when no hotel would take them in. Or so we think.

The story is retouching true incidents in the life of Sister Rosetta Tharpe, an important pioneer in American popular music as well as a touring influence on the marriage of secular and sacred soul-searching.

Rosetta is trying to teach a protégé, Marie, to sway her hips more, play the piano with more ragtime, loosen her higher church leanings and get down and dirty – like this music demands. The two learn something about each other and about music as they talk. It’s sort of like a master class, a back and forth of how to stay with God while cutting loose. It provides the dramatic excuse for the voices to command the stage.

This same production, with many of the same technical elements, originated at Skokie’s Northlight Theater near the Illinois birthplace of its author George Brant, whose “Grounded” was previously done at the Stiemke in 2017.

He has an ear for little humors in expository dialog. He makes the script better than those 1940s Hollywood musicals in which songwriters and singers invented tunes on the spot, though they do a bit of that here. Maybe it’s more convincing because it isn’t Robert Young or Red Skelton writing riffs in the moment but accomplished musicians: Roston as Marie slowing losing her shell and Thomas as the towering, irreverent and slightly seductive Rosetta.

The actual piano playing and much of the guitar work are supplied hidden by Morgan E. Stevenson at the piano (also the music director) and guitarist Benjamin Oglesby-Davis, but the performers onstage are skilled enough to pretend both the piano playing (we can’t see their fingers) and the guitar fingering (which we can see). Both also fit the definition of extraordinary singers who can embody characters.

Roston, who has tackled stage portrayals of Dionne Warwick and Billie Holiday, can fit her singing to many occasions, holding powerhouse notes until your own breath runs out. Thomas can scale high yet go so low and earthy that it is hard to categorize her vocal range. There is a speech technique known as vocal fry which is often annoying in a politician’s voice – but when employed by top singers it allows just the right brassy, gutsy effects in blues and rock ‘n’ roll. You will rarely find it so well used and controlled.

Playwright Brant works hard to shape the music into story points. But the illusions disappear within the singing power. Roston is at first playing a character younger than she is. Thomas tries to keep her singing in line with the story’s purpose, but it is sometimes just for gospel effect.

There is a nice little history lesson along the way, but all we really want is for the singers to erupt again.

Marie and Rosetta continues at the Milwaukee Rep’s Stiemke Studio through Dec. 15, with tickets and season information available online.

Dominique Paul Noth served for decades as film and drama critic, later senior editor for features at the Milwaukee Journal. You’ll find his blog here and here.