Margin Notes: Slam Frank

Slam Frank

Olivia Bernábe as Anita and Walker Stovall as
ASM. Photo by Shawn Salley Photography.

Seen on: Saturday, 10/03/26.

Plot and Background

Inspired by a viral tweet asking if Anne Frank ever acknowledged her white privilege, Joel Sinensky and Andrew Fox conceived Slam Frank: The Anne-Frank Afro-Latin Hip-Hop Musical. Following a hit run with Asylum NYC, the encore production comes to the Orpheum Theatre. The premise of this production is a progressive theater attempts to retell Anne Frank's story while including as many diverse identities as possible, from ethnicity to gender to sexuality to neurodiversity.

Thoughts:

Play: We open with the "Artistic Director" of a progressive theater company standing onstage to introduce the show, beginning with a land acknowledgment which stutters to a stop when he can't remember the name of the indigenous people who originally lived here. He then goes on to explain his attempt as a cis white male to make space for other identities to express themselves, and the audience is chuckling along, knowingly acknowledging the performative wokeness and over-correcting we are about to witness in longform. And then we're in it, with Anita--not Anne--rapping into a hand-held mic about writing in her diary.

As the show goes on, the various characters emerge as one marginalized identity or another--or many intersectional ones. Anita is a Latina teen told to repress her ethnic identity to be more commercial (even as the ghost of her Abuela encourages her to remember who she is). Edith, Anne's mother, is a proud Black woman in a bold African print dress, who continually breaks the fourth wall to remind us that this is happening "today"--both the today of 1944 but also the today of 2026. Otto, her husband, is every neurodiverse identity the writers can throw at the wall, while also a closeted homosexual. The family Van Daan, hiding in the attic with the Franks, consist of Mr. Van Daan, the cis white villain; Mrs. Van Daan, a repressed woman on a journey of self-actualization; and Peter, their child who comes out as nonbinary (this of course leads to Anita discovering this must mean she's pansexual). Peter's number, the enjoyable tuneful "Non-Binary," is a showstopper coming-out for all characters (except Mr. Van Daan and Margot--hang on, we'll get to her in a moment), featuring each ripping off their yellow stars in favor of stars with the flag colors for their respective identities, complete with pronouns. The show-within-a-show and its characters are so enamored of exploring these identities that the actual circumstances of the Franks and Van Daans hiding in an attic are forgotten: at one point a character brings up the Nazis, and Anita, bewildered, replies, "the what?" That's the point, though: the writers takes the deliberate approach of appropriating a story without addressing the real circumstances, à la Cole Escola's conscious decision to not do any research when writing O, Mary! (reinforced especially in Slam Frank by the mispronunciation of character names: the t in Margot shouldn't be silent, for example). The extent of that appropriation--taking a story explicitly about the attempted annihilation of the Jewish people and making it explicitly about anyone else (reducing Jewish people, as unfortunately is happening a lot right now, to "white Europeans")--reaches full expression with Anita's sister Margot. Margot is the only character remotely coded as Jewish: lighting Shabbat candles and wearing a scarf over her hair. She's also the only character who doesn't speak.

This show is riding multiple lines, alternately delving into satire, parody/spoof, camp, and pastiche, which means it doesn't always know quite where it's landing. The tuneful and clever score is largely pastiche, with rap, slam poetry, and melodies and numbers serving as clear homages to Hamilton, In the Heights, and even the chord and melodic structures of Jason Robert Brown and Stephen Sondheim. The humor of the book is, or wants to be, subversive, but largely it comes off as camp and light satire: still clean enough not to offend. But the audience is having a rip-roaring time, laughing at themselves and at the characters in equal measure. And then it slips. The production has asked reviewers to not spoil all surprises and structures, especially in the final third. That request makes this difficult to discuss, because that final third is when things fall apart. Does the satire finally become biting, or is it just punching down? Is it even still a joke when the audience agrees? I personally think they take things too far: a friend sitting elsewhere at my performance said her row went silent, whereas my row was howling with laughter. There's a partial rescue with another overcorrection, but it's hard to pull back and I'll confess I never quite made it back to a happy engagement. And ending on a sour note is not the best way to exit what was originally a fun and silly romp.

Cast: The cast is uniformly great, led by the spirited Olivia Bernábe as Anita, with a flawless voice and full commitment to the cluelessness of the production. And overall, that's something these performers have in spades: the show wouldn't work if the cast tried to distance themselves from their caricatures, but everyone here is in it for the long haul.  Austen Horne brings true majesty to Edith as well as perfect timing and delivery. Alex Lewis, Jaz Zepatos, and John Anker Bow are solid as the Van Daans, and even Walker Stovall has quiet winking fun as the ASM. Amelia Louise Barr, who doubles as the ghost of Abuela and Margot, has a stunning voice when she's allowed to sing, and an evocative presence even when she stays mute. Rocky Paterra's Otto wears a little thin after a while, but I blame the writing more than the acting for that, as it's basically the same joke over and over.

Design: I'll confess I don't fully understand all the elements of Adam Koch's set design. The screens and their content are delightfully done by Zack Lobel and Nicholas Ferarri (especially delightful is the opening countdown with a joke I don't want to spoil). But some of that video is hosted in piles of old box televisions framing the space--and I don't really know when we are, since they evoke neither 1944 nor the now-now upon which Edith insists. Sarah Lockwood's costume design is, however, pitch-perfect: from Anita's red plaid pinafore to match her diary (and replete with a pocket big enough to hold the diary--I'm jealous) to Peter's blue striped polo, a clear allusion to Evan Hansen and his teenage angst. And then the pivoting of Edith's bright print dress and head scarf against Otto's normie argyle sweater vest, instantly communicates the characters and their relationship, as clearly as Mrs. Van Daan's skintight blush-pink skirt suit communicates her character and dynamic with her repressive husband. And of course, as discussed above, Margot's muted blue-toned long skirt, long sleeve blouse, and headscarf place her more in a shtetl than Amsterdam, but it's also an efficient coding of her singular Jewish identity, recalling Tevye's daughters in Fiddler on the Roof. 

***

Running: Now playing at Orpheum Theatre. Opening: October 4, 2026. Closing: November 30, 2026.
Category: musical
Length: 1 hour, 50 minutes, no intermission.

Creative Team

Book: Joel Sinensky
Music and Lyrics: Andrew Fox
Director: Sam LaFrage
Team: Esosa Oviasu (Choreography), Alex Harrington (Music Direction), Adam Koch (Set), Sarah Lockwood (Costume), Jamie Roderick (Lighting), Gage Baker (Sound), Zack Lobel (Video), Nicholas Ferarri (Associate Video), Devin Orr (Props), Nikita Chernin (Stage Manager), Stuart Metcalf (Production Management), Evan Bernardin Productions (General Management), Carlwell Redmon (Company Management), Karie Koppel (Casting), Katie Rosin/Kampfire (Marketing and Publicity. Producing Team: GFour Productions, Stage Time, Steven Brandon, Andrew Fox, Alex Lewis, Joel Sinensky.
Cast: Olivia Bernábe, Amelia Louise Barr, John Anker Bow, Austen Horne, Alex Lewis, Rocky Paterra, Jaz Zepatos, Walker Stovall.

Alex Lewis, center, as Peter, with Olivia Bernábe as Anita,
Jaz Zepatos as Mrs. Van Daan, Rocky Paterra as Otto, and
Austen Horne as Edith. Photo by Shawn Salley Photography.