I don’t know about you all but I really enjoy history particularly American history and love any chance I get to learn about eras of our great country. That’s why I was very excited to get to see the new musical Suffs that is playing at Eccles with the current national tour and fortunately it did not disappoint. I highly recommend checking out this boisterous look at the many women who helped give women the right to vote in the United States.

One of my favorite parts of this musical is how it captures the variety of the personalities and approaches of the women who created the movement for the 19th amendment. Some were activists led by Alice Paul (Maya Keleher) who is of the protest and hunger strike variety where Carrie Chapman Catt (understudy Merrill Peiffer) is the let’s have tea and convince you of how great we are variety. Both have value and honestly as an old fogie myself I could often relate more to Catt’s methodology over Paul. They also include these different approaches and personalities with the Black women in the movement with varied approaches from Ida B Wells (Danyel Fulton) and Mary Church Terrell (Trisha Jeffrey) (Mary believes in ‘dignified agitation, Ida thinks that is futile and they must do more.) This variation in the characters and philosophies helps the show feel more authentic and less like you are watching historical propaganda (which can be a problem with some of these type of shows.)

Probably the performance that veers the most into caricature is the portrayal of Woodrow Wilson (Marissa Hecker) but honestly I was fine with that as he was one of our most deplorable presidents and doesn’t deserve many accolades in my opinion. I was surprised how early they got to the march but Suffs is similar to Hamilton in that it gives the full scope of Paul’s career even giving us an epilogue with her work in the 1970s and the young activist of that time (a nice full-circle moment for the character.)

Speaking of Hamilton there will be many who compare Suffs to that iconic show, and they wouldn’t be incorrect. It’s an obvious inspiration especially with the more contemporary-sounding songs like “Finish the Fight” but it does enough to stand on its own so it avoids feeling like just a female Hamilton. This national tour is directed by Leigh Silverman and all the technical elements help add to effectiveness of the strong character-work from the actors. I particularly enjoyed the lighting design by Lap Chi Chu and how it created a silhouette feel which was perfect for the turn of the century setting and added to the tense tone in certain scenes.

The costumes by Paul Tazewell are also terrific with each suffragette expressing their personality through their clothes some more ostentatious, some more riscay and showy, others more masculine depending on the character.

I was a little sad that the narrative leaves out some important voices especially Elizabeth Cady Stanton who’s speech The Solitude of Self is one of my favorites in American history. That said, I realize you can’t include everyone and it is a pretty stuffed show so that’s bound to happen. Still, one of the times they mentioned Susan B Anthony they could have talked about Stanton but oh well. Helen Keller would have been another person they could have depicted as she was a suffragette and a fighter for disability awareness as well.

The national tour of Suffs would be a great show to integrate into a home school curriculum or to just educate teens about American history (there is a song with profanity but they will just have to deal with it!) Like I said, I highly recommend taking any children 10 and up and enjoying it together. It is playing through November 16th and tickets can be purchased here.

Suffs has music lyrics and a book by Shaina Taub and it first premiered off-Broadway at The Public Theater in 2022 and then on Broadway in 2024. It won Tony Awards for best book and best score for Taub.

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