History Echoes Loudly in an Outstanding Revival of ‘Camping with Henry and Tom’

 

Could the parallels to today be any clearer?  Mark St. Germain wrote Camping with Henry and Tom some thirty years ago as an historical speculation.  Yet its themes have proven enduring and the Palm Beach Dramaworks production leavens the play’s comedic elements, shining a light on contemporary political discourse.

The play is based on the fact that inventor Thomas Edison and industrialist Henry Ford did go camping every year with their friends John Burroughs, the nature writer, and Harvey Firestone, the tire manufacturer.  They called themselves the Vagabonds.  In 1921 they invited President Warren G. Harding who accepted. 

Enough of the facts; playwright St. Germain imagines such a trip with Harding only accompanied by Edison and Ford followed by a tailing secret service agent, in this engaging 3-hander-plus-1 dramedy.  It is a fascinating character study of an “accidental” President, who would rather just bask in the glow of approbation shaking hands on the White House lawn, along with the ultra right-wing Ford (a wannabe President), and the cynical inventor, Edison, who interjects much humor and truth into the mix.  Indeed, if history doesn’t repeat itself, it certainly rhymes with this production.

John Leonard Thompson, Tom Wahl and Rob Donohoe

 

The plot is straightforward: the three are on their way to escape their normal (but famous) lives to a camping ground in a Model T Ford, with Henry Ford at the wheel after furtively arranging the trip to elude the press and secret service as well.  They encounter a deer on the road, damaging the car, although its three occupants are OK (but not so much the deer who amusingly hangs on for most of the play), and suddenly we have a substantive play of dramatic confrontations and comic interactions, Ford having an agenda, clearly analogizing the play’s themes to the temper of our times. 

Director William Hayes has a definite vision for setting the mood, beginning with his version of a silent movie of the trip up until the unfortunate rendezvous with the deer.  He establishes a slapstick foreshadowing of the many laughs yet to come, which gives the audience a reason to like all the characters until the tone gradually changes and the afternoon wanes into evening.

He blends this into a breathtaking set by Bert Scott, consisting of a small clearing in the woods outside Licking Creek, Maryland.  The set has three dimensional elements of the woods as well as a seemingly functioning fire pit right on stage, giving the play a fitting verisimilitude.  The audience feels it can reach out and feel the flora.  A Model T Ford completes Scott’s perfect scenic design.

Hayes has assembled three company veterans for the major rolls.  They’ve acted together on the PBD stage so many times that this production soars as a tightly knit ensemble production.  Hayes keeps their performances cohesive and well-integrated in spite of their diverse personalities discussing their families, fame, and failures.  He allows his actors’ arcs to shine, from Ford’s baleful plans to becoming crestfallen, from Harding’s acquiescence to redemption and then acceptance, and Edison from comic foil to change agent.

John Leonard Thompson plays the obsessive Henry Ford, envisioning unlimited energy from a hydro-power project he hopes to steal from the government (hence, cornering and blackmailing President Harding on this trip ), as well as becoming the next President of the US, enlisting his “sociology boys” to gather dirt on Harding.  It is blackmail pure and simple under the guise of patriotism.  Thompson knows how to win over the audience as he relates some home-spun tales of his life and his admiration of Edison, as well as revealing his damaged relationship with his son, Edsel, but he also shows the very dark side of his character in musing what he would do “with the Jews.”

Ford delivers some eerie comparisons to today’s politics: “I want to knock some rust off this government!  I want to give it back to the people and boot the moneychangers out of the temple so fast.  It will make their heads spin.  The shylocks and the socialists who don’t believe in a honest day’s work, and suck our teats instead….I want to fix this country and put it back on the road again, and that’s why I’m going to be the thirtieth President of the United States!”  Or, in thinking about running, and his deficiencies as a public speaker, he proclaims that “I’ll just pay the best people as to how to say it and what to say.”  Thompson, a frequent actor on the PBD stage, gives yet another stand-out, memorable performance such as his portrayal as Teach in American Buffalo fifteen years ago.

Another PBD veteran, Tom Wahl, who plays Warren Harding, assiduously peals away the layers of his character.  It is a deceptively difficult role.  The buoyantly optimistic, hail-fellow-well-met characterization by Wahl becomes an exuberant epiphanic portrayal of being released from the bondage of an inauthentic self.  It took the rising conflict with Ford in the play for this realization to emerge and Wahl embraces the moment, reveling in it with great comic chops, a fantasy of being free from the burdens of the presidency and his wife (who considers her husband a trophy President)!  His is a truly remarkable performance, among many throughout the years at PBD.

I haven’t counted them, but I would guess that in spite of the long theatrical resumes of his two costars, Rob Donohoe has had the most frequent appearances on the PBD stage.  The variety of his performances has been staggering, and his role as Thomas Edison in this play is another triumph.  It is delivered with a Mark Twain sense of humor and cynicism, self-deprecating and continuously ornery, with philosophical observations about “the damned human race.”  He admonishes Ford for his extravagant view of their accomplishments, pointing out their inventions just made things easier, not necessarily improving the world: “we’re toymakers; don’t get noble on me, Henry.”  Or his observation about “the great American fairy tale of Justice.”

Yet for most of the play, Donohoe’s intensity is in hibernation, released finally by demoniacal plans of Ford.  His portrayal is transformed from observer to becoming a bold antagonist, from comic foil to a bulwark to protect the nation from what he clearly sees as a danger, Ford and others like him whose political currency is conspiracy theories and the quest for power and money.  He recognizes Harding’s humanity and posits that it is civil servants like the secret service agent who run the government.  He also has a deeply moving epiphany, when suddenly and tearfully he remembers the name of a boy who drowned when they were both children, something he had emotionally buried, a poignant “Rosebud moment” in the play.  Superlatives are lacking for Donohoe’s performance.  

John Leonard Thompson, Rob Donohoe and Tom Wahl-photo by Curtis Brown Photography

 

Rounding out the cast is another familiar face, John Campagnuolo as Colonel Edmund Starling, a secret service man.  He is all business in his trench coat, goggles up on his forehead after finding the three of them, borrowing Edsel’s Model T.  He “takes care of” the hurt deer shocking Harding.  And off the four go, to return to civilization; things have changed to remain the same.

Costume design is by Brian O’Keefe, 1921 authentic in detail and in that moment in time.  All wear suits, and those ubiquitous straw boater hats but Edison and Harding also are outfitted in vests.  Harding has a suit for the first Act, and an identical one for the second as he has slept on the ground soiling the original one.  

Lighting design is by Kirk Bookman capturing light for the late afternoon as it wanes into night.  White light illuminates the actors in the moonlight, and while, trying to determine their compass direction, they face the warm lighting of the sunset in the west. The seemingly functioning fire pit is brought to life by very clever lighting.  

Sound design is by Roger Arnold, authentically creating the chatter of the forest, frogs, birds, and crickets permeating the production, plus the shuffling sounds of the injured deer as well as the echoes of the actors’ occasional shouts for help.  And of course the sound of the Model T’s untimely meeting with the deer, launching all that follows. 

Mark St. Germain has written such a relevant play, propitiously brought back to life at this moment in time by Palm Beach Dramaworks in a well-conceived, entertaining, but thought provoking production.  At the denouement, Edison observes that Harding has something that he and Ford lack to which Ford immediately replies: “weakness” (our current president posted “only the weak will fail” on social media last week).  Ford failed to understand that Edison meant a sense of shared human connection and understanding.

 

 

Open Letter to Senator Chris Murphy

 

(Image credit: Mike Luckovich / Copyright 2025 Creators Syndicate)

As usual, political cartoons speak volumes.  Thank you, Mike Luckovich.

I meant to be at a “Hands Off” (I prefer “F**k Off”) rally today but writing might be slightly more effective than my body being there.  This letter to Senator Chris Murphy also went to my Florida representatives, with no expectations of a non-AI response.  And as Senator Murphy is not my representative, I already received an automated reply that I should direct my letter to one of my representatives, so I am in an endless loop of non-representation; it’s frustrating, infuriating, but mea culpa for moving from the northeast, too late in life now for me to reverse.

The motivation for writing to Murphy is his view that tariffs are a Trump tool to subjugate businesses, bending them to his transactional will as he has done with other institutions. 

The fact that none of the math makes sense, and seems to be concocted by a Dunning-Kruger schoolboy the night before the homework was due (after his cheerleader-worthy Press Secretary, Karoline Leavitt, implied they are the result of decades of careful deliberations, admonishing the press to “Trust in Trump”). 

There’s so much more to say, but for the time being here’s my letter to Senator Murphy:

 Dear Senator Murphy:  I lived in Connecticut for thirty years before retiring to Florida.  Yet I write to you as you’ve had the courage to speak out about President Trump’s true motivation regarding these senseless tariffs: they are but a tool to “gain fealty from private industry.”

He has torn apart the government to surround himself with acolytes, as well as bringing legal firms and even universities to their knees.  His power is now unchecked, by SCOTUS, and by Congress.  Thus we are well on our way to autocracy with kleptocrats in control and the Rule of Law stifled.

The markets have finally awakened to the reality of tariffs, a tax on the people, and a means of further undermining a world order which emerged after WWII.  Our adversaries’ prophecy that democracy will be destroyed from within seems to be coming true, while our traditional allies are left bewildered and have found they must fend for themselves.

We all know that these tariffs are not going to solve our deficit.  More sensible graduated income and inheritance taxes are needed, but that will not become reality with plutocrats in control of government and congress cowered by this president.

The final death knell could be selectively defaulting on debt, particularly when a large foreign debt holder such as China is due repayment of principal and interest, yet another potential “tool” like tariffs.  Instead, the present regime might offer cryptocurrency, perhaps closely tied to the Trump family’s Bitcoin mining enterprise.  This would be the ultimate undermining of the “full faith and credit” of the US dollar as the world’s reserve currency.  It’s not surprising that the dollar has seriously weakened with tariff announcements. 

“Only the weak will fail,” he texted in regard to the market selloff.  Senator Murphy, this nation turns our lonely eyes to you and others in Congress to put a stop to this attempted coup and desecration of the American way of life.  I’d be out protesting today if it were not for health reasons, so I have taken to the pen.

Sincerely and with thanks,

 

Cc: Representative Brian Mast

      Senator Rick Scott

      Senator Ashley Moody

 

The Art of Making Things Worse

 

As usual, Politico’s editorial cartoonist, Matt Wuerker, says more in his drawings than mere words can, so I begin with his conception of the present political chaos.

Little did I know.  I was just one of many pawns being used to carry out The Disrupter-in-Chief’s “plan” of destroying our democracy from within.  As his bizarre behavior and the ensuing bedlam began to overwhelm everyone after the election, I was reacting with every outrage by emailing or texting articles and thoughts to friends and family.  I’ve been duped, helping to make “awful into worse,” adding my anxiety to what they too were already feeling.  I’m resolving to choose my future messaging more carefully.  So forgive me my friends for these past indiscretions and just adding to what you were already feeling, dreading, suffering, while watching this all play out.

We’ve already gone to the point of no return in Trump’s second Presidency. If this was a story set to music (as dissonant as it would be), the tempo is now approaching “prestissimo” and if not resolved in some satisfactory way, it just collapses upon itself.

The numerous opportunities we had in our traditional political system to prevent the obscenity of this 47th Presidency have come and gone, two impeachments, not being able to bring him to trial for his culpability in the Jan 6 insurrection and his attempt to interfere with GA votes, his stacking SCOTUS with sycophants (Mitch McConnell deserves a special place in hell for that), and now we are left with the utter chaos of cartoon character Cabinet members, revenge plans, tariffs, deportations, and the final straw, DOGE and the anointed Elon Musk.

I write as if Trump is in charge.  He’s been called Putin’s useful fool.  But I also think he is a useful tool for a band of grafters, nihilists, right-wing zealots to whom the dim-witted American Public handed the keys to the kingdom.  Democracy is now dying by a thousand cuts daily, much faster than anyone could have anticipated, and being handed over to kleptocrats and kakistocrats.  (“Like all good illusionists, the kleptocrats know how to distract us from looking at their misdeeds and the kakistocrats know how to distract us from their ineptitude. They do it by talking to us about ideology and attacking those of their rivals. While we watch and play our part in these ideological circuses, they steal. Or tinker with government policies they don’t really understand.”….As quoted by https://carnegieendowment.org and originally published by El País, June 18, 2018)

What’s to be done with sycophants such as AG Pam Bondi who has decreed that someone who throws a tomato at a Tesla is a domestic terrorist while backing her mobster boss’s exoneration of the J6 insurrectionists?  What hypocrisy, but as long as the American public is entertained, job well done!

The lonely anti-Trumpism voices are some journalists and a fragmented Democratic leadership.  The Republican majority in Congress is complicit with its silence, ceding power to the executive branch.  The Judiciary now seems to be useless, and he has cowed the nation’s largest law firms into submission.  Lots of luck getting legal representation!

I’m almost resigned to the fact that if we as a nation survive the next 4 years it will be purely by accident.  To think that we’ve already alienated alliances forged after WWII in these few short weeks.  I’d be embarrassed to show my face in Canada and Europe, and almost any place in the world.

During the weeks since the inauguration, I’ve been frantically forwarding articles from the New York Times, even the Wall Street Journal, from the historian, Heather Cox Richardson, and authors I follow on Substack, many serious journalists and others best described as “acerbic humorists” who plant F-bombs galore in their writing and therefore effectively channel the absolute fury and helplessness we feel.  I was an uninvited curator of such news for friends, but really was intended to make ME feel good that I was doing something.

But what to do with the gut-retching information I normally send in some form? Perhaps I’ll let my frustrations play out in this space from time to time, collecting them and posting when I reach a particular, yet undefined nadir.  I certainly don’t want to set a schedule, like “the weekly list of shock and rage” although there is guaranteed to be plenty of content.  

The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal thankfully remain excellent newspapers with both seemingly drawn more towards the middle from their traditional political extremes.  This is good as other papers such as the LA Times and the Washington Post seem to be selling out, kissing the dystopian ring to avoid the wrath of the “President.”

Unfortunately, the Palm Beach Post used to be a real newspaper, but it has become a shell of itself with mostly syndicated articles.  Its original editorial decisions are now subject to local or political pressures. The Gannett Group, now the owner of the PBP, recently dismissed Tony Doris, the PBP opinion editor of some 20 years, because of such pressure.  The NYT asked Doris to comment and he said: “They’re afraid of their shadow. I think it speaks to a misunderstanding or failure to engage with the mission of an editorial page.”

It is symbolic of what is happening all over the country but his dismissal was a particular blow to me as he published my letters and editorial opinions without much change; he seemed to welcome future ones.  Now the venue of local newspapers is disappearing as well; they are really controlled circulation advertising flyers.  Any weakening of 4^th estate has dire consequences.

One feels as if one MUST do something though.  I made an attempt to engage my Congressman Brian Mast.  He is an obedient MAGA disciple. Yet I hoped a reasonable letter might make the difference.  I appealed to his patriotism as a veteran of Operation Enduring Freedom.  As a congressman, surely his allegiance to the Constitution would give him pause I thought and as the Chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee he might have something of meaning to say about the administration denigrating Ukraine for merely defending itself.  Instead I got what might have been an AI response, but nonetheless I sent a follow up, pointing out the deficiencies of the response, not expecting a reply, and there has been none.

The latest outrage which FOX and Friends and the administration are whitewashing is the Signal messaging app security breach detailing plans for the attack on Yemen. (True to the MAGA gospel of deflection, AG Bondi declared that the incident will not be criminally investigated as “it was a very successful mission.”)  Talk about hypocrisy, the Sturm und Drang over Hillary and her server, while rationalizing the greatest breach of national security I can remember by the amateurs we call our Cabinet, even inviting in a reporter and then saying he’s corrupt!  The content of that discussion is chilling.  It’s like they were playing a video game, replete with emojis of the American flag, a fist, fire, whatever. The real damage (aside from the danger it might have caused our military) is further alienating those European allies who will now remember an American promise is only as valid as the administration that made them as well as the covert hostility by this administration towards them.  (Vance referred to the action as "bailing Europe out again," while Hegseth accused Europe's reliance on U.S. military might as "freeloading" and "pathetic.") 

We need an opposition dream team to come forth, one that can organize and coordinate meaningful protests, a team representing both sides of the aisle: perhaps Beto O’Rourke, Tim Walz, Adam Kinzinger, and Liz Cheney?  Each has spoken out for the truth and each is currently out of politics.  Some have suggested Maryland Governor Wes More as a potential leader.  His is a story of exceptionalism.  Credible leadership is needed now before it is really too late.   

As I was concluding this piece I saw Heather Cox Richardson’s most recent “Letters from an American,” with a particular passage I would normally forward to many.  So instead, I quote it here.  I’ve turned over a new leaf!

The craziness going on around us in the first two months of the second Trump administration makes a lot more sense if you remember that the goal of those currently in power was never simply to change the policies or the personnel of the U.S. government. Their goal is to dismantle the central pillars of the United States of America—government, law, business, education, culture, and so on—because they believe the very shape of those institutions serves what they call ‘the Left.’

Their definition of ‘the Left’ includes all Americans, Republicans and Independents as well as Democrats, who believe the government has a role to play in regulating business, providing a basic social safety net, promoting infrastructure, and protecting civil rights and who support the institutional structures Americans have built since World War II.

In place of those structures, today’s MAGA leaders intend to create their own new institutions, shaped by their own people, whose ideological purity trumps their abilities.