Review: Addison’s WaterTower Theatre revisits Louis Armstrong in ‘Satchmo at the Waldorf’

Louis Armstrong’s crowd-pleasing public persona got him called an Uncle Tom and worse.

In Satchmo at the Waldorf, playwright Terry Teachout mounts a modest if effective defense of the jazz trumpeter and vocalist. He’s portrayed in a relaxed, naturalistic manner by Sam Henderson in a new production at WaterTower Theatre, seen in a preview Wednesday.

Henderson, a Baylor theater and film professor, also plays Armstrong’s mob-connected manager Joe Glaser and frequent critic Miles Davis in the one-man show. Indicative of director Feleceia Wilson’s easygoing, minimalist approach to the material, the switches among characters are marked only by subtle changes in lighting and Henderson’s tone and inflection.

Teachout’s script provides important context to Armstrong’s life, and not just the arc from his humble beginnings in New Orleans’ sketchy Storyville neighborhood to the nonstop tours, TV and movie appearances and recordings that made him a star.

Having lived in the Jim Crow era of rampant racism, Armstrong spends a lot of time explaining what it’s like to be rich and famous, but also Black. He may have had the money to eat T-bone steaks in fine restaurants, but he dined in the kitchen. He also gets into his lesser known civil rights activism, his four wives and his relationship with other icons, from Bing Crosby to Al Capone.

Set in 1971 in a backstage dressing room at New York’s Waldorf-Astoria after his last concert — four months before his death — Satchmo gives Armstrong the chance to lay out his philosophy and tell stories about the road, his mutually beneficial relationship with Glaser and his feelings about jazz and the Black audience that left him and his traditional style behind.

The conceit is that the tired and ailing, if still spry, 70-year-old is collecting his thoughts on a reel-to-reel tape recorder to set the record straight. He’s angry at Glaser, who he says stole from him. It’s more complicated than that, as Armstrong will admit as the play proceeds. Still, his hurt and disappointment ring true.

Glaser gets to tell his side. Essentially, he was controlled by the Mafia. Armstrong didn’t want anything to do with the business side when he hired Glaser, who even picked his band members and the songs he would play.

The program describes Satchmo as “a work of fiction, freely based on fact.” The truth is Teachout relies heavily on recordings the musician made about his life.

Nothing feels fabricated. Armstrong is candid and profane in ways he would never be in public. But he’s not that far from the Armstrong we already know. He wanted to please audiences, didn’t see anything wrong with it. Satchmo is our opportunity to understand why.

Details

Through April 28 at the Addison Theatre and Conference Centre, 15650 Addison Road, Addison. $49. watertowertheatre.org .