| THEATRE PREVIEW: Death row drama’s
shocking tactics The Exonerated
By Grainne McLoughlin
 London’s
Riverside Studios in Hammersmith is set to play host to some of Hollywood’s
greats including Stockard Channing, Kristin Davis, Danny Glover and Aidan
Quinn in its upcoming production of The Exonerated.
The powerful play which dramatises the experiences of several wrongfully-convicted
death row inmates, features a rotating cast of those already mentioned
alongside Kate Mulgrew.
The Exonerated typifies the universal nightmare. To be sentenced to death
for a crime you did not commit. To spend decades on death row with only
one way out — execution.
Despite America’s continued use of the death penalty others have
been more fortunate and released after decades of torment in a prison
cell facing what looked like certain death. Their harrowing true stories
are the real-life drama of The Exonerated.
A lacerating production constructed from the testimonies of six such survivors
of death row Bob Balaban’s New York production of The Exonerated
is now here in London.
The stories of Sunny Jacobs — a mother of two who spent 16 years
on death row on the basis of false evidence — Kerry Max Cook —
a Texan who was wrongly convicted of murder — and Delbert Tibbs
— a black Chicago poet who was falsely accused of rape and murder
while hitch-hiking across America are all told.
Each has come to terms with their experience in a different way. Some
remain bitter and angry while others have turned it to positive use. But
all remain haunted by having their deepest fears realised.
Scriptwriters Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen travelled all over America
interviewing 40 of the 89 death row inmates who were ‘exonerated’
in 2000. These true life accounts reveal the darker side of America’s
justice system and how strong the human spirit sometimes has to be.
A must see.
The Exonerated will play Riverside Studios from February 24 to June 11.
For further information and tickets contact 020 8237 1111 or log on to
www.riversidestudios.co.uk |
