Last night I went to see “The Rivalry” at Ford’s Theatre, Norman Corwin’s 1958 play dramatizing the Lincoln-Douglas debates, and written on the occasion of their centennial.
Going into it, I thought two full hours of a play based on a political debate would be a bit much. But I, and the other three nerds I went with, found it quite engrossing. Some of the acting (mostly at the end of a couple scenes, to end them on a climax) was a tad over-the-top, but overall, I thought the performances were very solid, and it made for a very enjoyable evening. It’s also a great opportunity to see seven debates’ worth of great rhetoric boiled down into a tidy two-hour package. Perhaps predictably (they’re a fairly theater-going lot), I saw one of the Justices (and spouse) there.
The play runs until February 14. Schedule here.