Shaina Taub created the musical “Suffs” to share an important chapter of American history that she was never taught in school and had to find out about for herself. The show, for which she wrote the book, music and lyrics and also played the starring role of Alice Paul in the original New York productions, tells of the struggle for American women to win the right to vote.
“Suffs” became one of the most uplifting and celebrated Broadway musicals of recent years. Taub herself won Tony awards for Best Book of a Musical and Best Original Score, Outer Critics Circle awards for Outstanding Book of a Musical and Outstanding New Score and a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Music. The first national tour will be at The Bushnell in Hartford from Jan. 27 through Feb. 1.
Taub, a Vermont native and NYU Tisch School of the Arts graduate, is still all about spreading the story.
“I always hoped we could get a national tour,” she said. “In some ways it’s more important than the Broadway run. I grew up in the American public school system hungry for stories like this, and it had never made its way to me.”
Maya Keleher as suffragist Alice Paul in Shaina Taub’s musical “Suffs” at The Bushnell from Jan. 27 through Feb. 1. (Joan Marcus)
“Suffs” begins with speeches at the National American Woman Suffrage Association convention in 1913, covers the growth of the U.S. suffrage movements and its attempts to convince the government (including President Woodrow Wilson) of the virtue and value of their cause, celebrates the passage of the 19th Amendment in 1920 and also looks toward the future with references to the Equal Rights Amendment.
The Hartford Courant was one of the major newspapers in the early 1900s which aggressively editorialized against giving women the right to vote. “Being against suffrage was the prevailing sentiment of the day,” Taub said. “It’s easy to look back and think that the success of the suffrage movement was inevitable.”
The point of “Suffs” is that it wasn’t.
When writing the musical, Taub said one of her “guiding principles” was that “I didn’t want audiences to just pat themselves on the back.” She wanted to show that the struggle was real and that it can be ongoing. Another principle was that it refused to tell the story as a rote, dry history lesson. “I was more interested in humanizing these women and show the conflicts in themselves. How does a group like this come together? How does it clash and collide?”
While researching the suffrage movement, Taub said she was struck by “how theatrical and visceral the movement was — the pageantry, the marching in the streets. How they all wore white.”
“Suffs” dramatizes real-life suffragists who were instrumental in getting women the right to vote in the United States in the early 20th century. (Joan Marcus)
She had her own attachment to the material, but Taub credits “Suffs” lead producer Rachel Sussman with having wanted to do a musical about suffrage for years and for encouraging Taub to write one. By the time she tackled “Suffs,” Taub’s Broadway presence had been steadily growing for over a decade. She both performed in and wrote music scores for two Shakespeare adaptations done by The Public Theater’s Public Works program. She played Princess Mary in “Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812” in 2013 and was one of the Fates in the original off-Broadway production of “Hadestown.” While working on “Suffs,” she also wrote the lyrics for Elton John’s music in the musical version of “The Devil Wears Prada.” Currently she is playing Emma Goldman, a role she had played before, in the Broadway revival of the musical “Ragtime.”
Taub said she had been looking for a full-length project to write when Sussman suggested one on suffrage. Delving into the material, “I couldn’t believe that someone hadn’t done it already,” she said. “I kept looking over my shoulder.” The 100th anniversary of the passage of the 19th Amendment was in 2020, and in recent years there have been numerous TV and movie projects about women’s rights in the 1970s and other eras.
“It was a difficult piece to write. It was incredibly daunting but it just appealed to me,” Taub said. A structure and an entry point didn’t immediately reveal themselves. She insisted on playing out the whole stories of two conflicting forces within the movement. “The older suffragists who were urging patience and diplomacy and the more radical members who were burning Woodrow Wilson in effigy,” she said.
“It is so difficult to get a new musical on Broadway,” Taub said. “The fact that we got ‘Suffs’ to a Broadway theater, I couldn’t believe it.”
A bit of political pageantry from the first national tour of “Suffs.” (Joan Marcus)
Now the show is on tour and hitting states that played a part in the real-life suffrage movement over a century ago. Taub said she didn’t have to make any significant changes in the show for it to go on the road and that most of the significant revisions had already happened between the off-Broadway and Broadway productions. The tour features the same designers as on Broadway. Taub also said she has realized that playing Alice Paul, playing Emma Goldman in “Ragtime,” getting older and so many other elements have affected her perspective on “Suffs.” She has accepted it as a finished project or “I would keep rewriting it forever.”
Taub said she’s “thrilled” with the cast, which like the other productions is all female, even when the roles involve President Wilson and pro-suffrage lawyer Dudley Malone. On tour, Maya Keleher plays the role of Alice Paul originated by Taub, with Maya Grandy as Carrie Chapman Catt, Danyel Fulton as Ida B. Wells, Gwynne Wood as Lucy Burns, Livvy Marcus as Doris Stevens, Joyce Meimei Zheng as Ruza Wenclawska, Monica Tulia Ramirez as Inez Milholland, Trisha Jeffrey as Mary Church Terrell, Brandi Porter as Dudley Malone, Jenny Ashman as Woodrow Wilson, Victoria Pekel as Phyllis Terrell, with Tami Dahbura, Annalese Fusar, Marissa Hecker, Amanda Lopez, Merrill Peiffer, Jenna Lea Rosen, Gretchen Sharpe, Aquila Sol and Laura Stracko also in the cast.
Many of the characters are actual figures from U.S. history. Inez Milholland, for instance, was a crusading female lawyer, peace activist and suffragist, while Ruza Wenclawska was a union organizer. “Suffs” has many stories to tell beyond that of Alice Paul, the activist who at the center of many of the key actions which helped convince the country that women should vote.
Taub is delighted not just that “Suffs” is touring but that in many cases it is playing at larger theaters to larger audiences than the Broadway production could. She is wasting no time in getting “Suffs” out there, having initiated special grant for 10 schools to do a new “Suffs Jr.” adaptation for youth performers for free before the rights are granted nationwide. Now, middle schoolers will be learning about suffrage the way Taub needed to when she was that age. “I had to write the show my 14-year-old self would’ve wanted.”
“Suffs” runs from Jan. 27 through Feb. 1 at The Bushnell, 166 Capitol Ave., Hartford. Performances are Tuesday through Friday at 7:30 p.m., Saturday at 2 and 7:30 p.m. and Sunday at 1 and 6:30 p.m. $48.50-$203. bushnell.org.