Caine Mutiny Court-Martial

Published 7:00 am Wednesday, April 19, 2006

Duty and deception will face off at Whidbey Playhouse. Suspense and suspicion will go nose-to-nose. And in the end, the triumphant may not be what was foreseen.

“The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial,” directed by Dottie Morgan, will open its three-week run Friday and open the doors to a courtroom drama pondering whether mutiny was committed on the high seas.

The World War II-era production features a cast of 17 men. The court-martial charges a young lieutenant Steve Maryk (Fernando Duran) with mutiny aboard the USS Caine, a battle-weathered minesweeper in the South Pacific. Maryk’s lawyer, Lt. Barney Greenwald (Marc Gonzalez), must defend whether Maryk was just in his decision to relieve the ship’s captain, Lt. Cmdr. Queeg (Fil Baca), of command during a fierce typhoon.

Trying to unravel Maryk’s claim that the captain was mentally unstable is Judge Advocate John Challee (Kent Peckenpaugh). Taking the stand and facing the reluctant defender are a bevy of character witnesses, including aspiring author Lt. Thomas Keefer (Michael Rivard) and Capt. Blakely (Fred Conley).

Supporting players include Ryan Charaba, Bob White, Norm Boynton, Steve Gormley, Keath Hallen-Worley, Andrew Kessler, Montee Walters, David Meyers, David Lawler, Jr., Rick Drummond and Curran Chew, who portrays the humorous signalman Junius Urban.

Director Dottie Morgan has been in love with “The Caine Mutiny” drama since seeing a 1953 pre-Broadway run of the show starring Henry Fonda in Santa Barbara, Calif.

“It’s one of the strongest dramas ever,” Morgan said.

“The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial” opens straight to the courtroom drama, leaving the testimonies to give background to the story and the officers’ lives.

“It gives insight to the human persona,” Peckenpaugh said. “These men had to make hard decisions at difficult times. Stress brings out the true, dark depths of each of us.”

“The Caine Mutiny” was a 1951 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Herman Wouk that had a successful stage adaptation on Broadway starring Fonda.

“The Caine Mutiny” is among the stories launched by a December 1944 typhoon, sometimes called “Halsey’s Typhoon,” that was documented to have destroyed a number of Pacific Fleet ships.

Morgan remembers the 1954 screen adaptation “The Caine Mutiny” starring Humphrey Bogart as being a blockbuster when it came out. It began on the water, showing all that occurred on the ship, and worked its way into the courtroom.

Robert Altman directed a 1988 TV movie, “The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial,” starring Jeff Daniels and Peter Gallagher that, like the Playhouse adaptation, focused on the courtroom proceedings.

One week after the show closes at the Whidbey Playhouse, “The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial” will make its Broadway revival starring David Schwimmer as Greenwald and Tim Daly as Challee.

“There’s immense longevity and popularity with this show,” Morgan said.

The show’s military advisor Berry Meaux, whose 30 years of military service began in 1945, sees the show as an educational opportunity for young military personnel and even people of the World War II generation.

Baca, who himself was a Navy lawyer early in his 31 years of service, said the play gives a true life glimpse into the world of military court-martials.

“It’s very altruistic, if anyone has ever wanted to know what a court-marital and being in a military-court is like, this is it,” he said.

Kent Peckenpaugh says his character is a typical prosecutor — he has a job to do, doesn’t love it or hate it, he’s just there to get the conviction. Challee walks into what he sees as a pretty “open and shut” case having studied it through and through while his opponent has had the case for only four days.

“As it progresses, though, he can see that it’s not going to go as expected,” Peckenpaugh said.

Greenwald is a defender who would rather be at the other bench. His past drives his defense style and Maryk must learn to trust his counsel.

“These men had a sense of duty that drove what they did,” Gonzalez said. “There was a sense of what was right and wrong that drove their motives.”

Greenwald’s is just one of the mystery stories among the men of the court.

“It’s a complex character, every time I get up and rehearse I learn something new about him,” Gonzalez said.

The second act is when the drama heats up. It is where the audience gets more insight into Queeg and where the reluctant prosecutor pulls out all the stops.

Baca describes his Queeg character as a neurotic perfectionist who thinks the whole world is out to get him. He runs his ship as a stern taskmaster, but what is he hiding? Trying to make a name for himself, he guides his career by perfection. But he has his own skeletons in his closet: weakness, fear and an uncontrollable nervousness.

“They were fighting a war, but also fighting the weather which in the Pacific could pop up at any time,” Meaux said. “It was unpredictable and made the desire for survival more intense.”

Like most courtroom dramas, everything comes down to the end, and don’t expect the final gavel — or bell in this case — to be the defining moment of “The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial.”

“This is definitely one of those shows where you get to end and realize they’ve been dropping clues for you the whole time,” Gonzalez said.

Attend the trial

Tickets are now on sale for Whidbey Playhouse’s production of the courtroom drama “The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial,” which will run April 21 through May 6 at the Playhouse.

Tickets are on sale at the box office at 730 SE Midway Blvd., Oak Harbor, or call 679-2237 or visit www.whidbeyplayhouse.com for dates and times.