Tammany Hall’s own Jimmy Walker (Martin Dockery, left) has the home-field advantage in his mayoral debate with Fiorello LaGuardia (Christopher Romero Wilson).
You may remember Soho Playhouse before the pandemic. Located in an antebellum row house just off Sixth Avenue, it often featured solo and Fringe Festival plays in its careworn mainstage theater or cabaret downstairs, its stairwell adorned with framed posters of shows that had played there.
Things are looking different inside Soho Playhouse these days, as it has been transformed for Tammany Hall, an immersive production with a cast of 12 that encompasses not only the theater and cabaret spaces but also backstage, an upstairs room—even the roof. That row house is again the Huron Club (the name still on the building), a real Tammany Hall hangout from the late 1800s into the 1920s.
Set on election night in November 1929, Tammany Hall was co-conceived by Soho Playhouse artistic director Darren Lee Cole (with British theater artist Alexander Flanagan-Wright). This vivid history lesson captures a flashpoint in New York City’s history: when Tammany Hall—which had controlled (and corrupted) city politics for more than a century—would finally be called to account and Fiorello LaGuardia began his ascent into legend. Oh, and the stock market had just crashed.
LaGuardia was a reform-minded Republican congressman when he ran for mayor in 1929 against Democratic (that is to say, Tammany) incumbent Jimmy Walker. In the play, they debate in a boxing ring—an homage to one of Walker’s favorite pastimes.
Walker steals a moment with his girlfriend Betty Compton (Marie Anello), a real Broadway performer in the 1920s, in the immersive play Tammany Hall. Photographs by Maria Baranova.
Tammany audience members also watch a few musical numbers from a new show starring showgirl Betty Compton, Walker’s mistress; musical theater was another pleasure of the bon vivant mayor, although, according to Tammany Hall, producing plays was a way Tammany laundered money. Walker himself serenades the crowd down in the speakeasy, just as election returns are coming in.
Between the goings-on in these main rooms, audience members might witness disreputable activity in a private room or office; be pressed for information or evidence by an attorney investigating Tammany Hall, Jacob Kresel; chat with Legs Diamond as he does card tricks; or drop in on dressing-room conversations between Betty and fellow performer Kiki Roberts, Diamond’s girlfriend.
All the characters really existed: Compton appeared on Broadway with Fred and Adele Astaire, and eventually married Walker; Diamond had a showgirl paramour nicknamed Kiki; Kresel was a special counsel to the judge who investigated Tammany Hall. However, there are occasional liberties in the chronology of events in the play: an offstage murder in the last scene actually occurred in 1928.
But the immersive aspect of the production succeeds, thanks to Dan Daly’s expert scenic design and committed work by the ensemble. The boxing area has the feel of the proverbial smoke-filled room and is decorated with period-looking knickknacks and old-fashioned photos and posters.
Jesse Castellanos portrays attorney Jacob Kresel in Tammany Hall at Soho Playhouse.
How much of the story lines and dialogue audience members take in depends on where in the building they choose to go and when. If comfort is a priority, they may not like the cramped spaces where some scenes are staged, going outside on the roof, or having to stand if all chairs are occupied for the debate. Get past that, though, and you can have fun mingling with these Jazz Age folks and taking part in a living history experience. Or should that be reliving history, since there’s plenty from this hundred-year-old milieu that sounds familiar: a combative mayoral campaign, politicians cloaking their self-interest in support for “the people,” allegations of vote tampering, an administration that thrives on graft and corruption...
The script is better in dialogue scenes involving multiple people than in its monologues, which are prone to exposition and speechifying. For example, Kiki in the dressing room:
Right now it feels like the world is just balancing on its axis and could topple any moment. Maybe it’s just this city. Maybe it’s the last few weeks. But the electricity that is running through all this, it’s too charged, too much.... I’m figuring out something that I don’t want to be true.... Working for Rothstein makes Legs a straight-up gangster.
LaGuardia and Walker were distinctive physically and temperamentally—LaGuardia, short, stout and pugnacious; Walker, charming, dapper and slick—and their appearances and personalities are well-reflected by the actors who play them in Tammany Hall: Christopher Romero Wilson and Martin Dockery, respectively. The rest of the cast, including Jesse Castellanos as Kresel, Marie Anello as Betty, and Shahzeb Hussain as Tammany underboss Curry, generally offer earnest, convincing portrayals as well. Immersive theater is nothing without detailed design work, notably Grace Jeon (costumes), Emily Clarkson (lighting) and Megan Culley (sound). The songs in the show-within-a-show were written by Gavin Whitworth, with choreography by Lola Selsky.
Tammany Hall plays through Jan. 9 at Soho Playhouse (15 Vandam St.). Performances are at 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. Wednesday through Friday; at 3, 7, and 9 p.m. Saturdays; and at 5 and 7 p.m. Sundays. Tickets are available by calling (212) 691-1555 or visiting sohoplayhouse.com.
