Jewish ‘Girl Power’ Rides into the Old Globe

By Sandi Masori

SAN DIEGO— In 1894, Latvian Jewish immigrant Annie Londonderry, (originally Annie Cohen Kopchovsky) set out to ride around the world on a bicycle.  Claiming that she was doing it to settle a bet, she had 15 months to complete the task, and make $5000 along the way.

The new musical Ride by Freya Catrin Smith and Jack Williams and directed by Sarah Meadows, currently playing at The Old Globe, celebrates this revolutionary journey by a woman who may just define moxie, if not chutzpah. Leaving her family, and the expectations of the time, she set out to do something that was simply not done, and especially not done by women of the time.

The play has two actors, Alex Finke as Annie and Livvy Marcus as Martha, an assistant to publisher Joseph Pulitzer.  You may think that with such a small cast it would be hard to tell an engaging and fantastical story but that would be wrong.  The story moves quickly, helped along by the musical numbers and the shape shifting Martha as she takes on various roles to illustrate Annie’s tale.

The show is funny and engaging, and even more interesting in that it’s based on a real person from history, one that few people have heard of before, or at least this reviewer and her companion had never heard of before.  And that it’s a Jewish woman, no less, well that’s just an added bonus.

The action starts when Annie comes to The New York World to apply for a job as a columnist.  Speaking to the audience as if we are the interviewer and committee, she begins her pitch.  She had requested an audio-visual device to assist in her presentation, but the projector is broken so she enlists the help of Martha the secretary to tell her tale.  Throughout the next 90 minutes Annie and Martha sing and act out the long journey around the world.  There’s even a Yiddish lullaby.

I enjoyed this show so much I don’t even know where to begin with the praise.  Finke is a perfect Annie- brassy, outspoken, Bostonian.  There is not one second that I had to suspend my disbelief; she is at every moment the embodiment of Annie. I cannot imagine anyone else playing the part.

Marcus as Martha is also incredible.  At Annie’s insistence, she portrays a variety of characters in Annie’s narrative of her journey.  Examples are a French customs agent that Annie befriends and a lover that she takes along the way. Marcus flawlessly portrays Martha enacting all these roles. It is as if the role of Martha was written especially for Marcus.

Kudos also go to Amy Jane Cook for some incredibly well-engineered scenic designs. The beginning of the show makes imaginative use of projections on a screen, and when the screen lifts, we are brought into an office that looks so sturdily built that I thought the entire show would take place there. In this office, various hidden doors and cubbies flip around and different pieces of props and scenery pop out.

And then as the story moves into other parts of the world, the entire office lifts up and we’re treated to a new scene making use of projections and some simple props. Yet another scene change dropping down from above takes us into the tenement home where Annie lives.  Words do not do justice to the creative and efficient set design.

Running through April 28, this is a great show to bring your daughters and granddaughters to (the boys can come as well, of course, my son enjoyed it very much) as it’s a story of a woman who refuses to be put into a box and not only manages to do things on her own terms, but gets others to buy into her vision along the way.  Let’s hear it for Jewish girl power!

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Sandi Masori is a theater and restaurant reviewer for San Diego Jewish World.