The Trail of Dreams
by James Arrington, Marvin Payne & Steven Kapp Perry
"James Arrington, Marvin Payne, and
Steven Kapp Perry have taken a fistful of true stories, a powerful
cast of twenty, the passion of pioneer dreams, and woven the
years of the Mormon exodus into a magical, musical tapestry of
laughter, tears, and joy. Come away down the Trail of Dreams!"
The Trail of Dreams cast recording won the 1999 Pearl Award for "Best
Soundtrack of the Year," and Steven Kapp Perry was nominated
as "Songwriter of the Year" for his work on this project.
Click for Cast List and Album Credits,
Click for "Trail of Dreams" Newspaper reviews
To Order, Click Here
Synopsis
- ACT I
-
- John Brown is having a dream. He is arranging
books all in a row -- old pioneer journals, lives over which,
for many, he was captain on the Mormon Trail. He has had this
dream before, but this time there is a mysterious woman, "a
friend," who picks up his book, drawing out his dreams and
sorrows -- the loss of his infant son and his passion for getting
his people to the valley alive. Pioneers, representing the 70,000
who crossed the plains, emerge from over the horizon and take
up the books, the lives they will play, weaving from John Brown's
memories of the 22-year exodus a tapestry of their dreams and
lives, now united across time into one company.
-
- The Grants, Jedediah and Caroline, and
their daughter Caddie and baby Margaret seek deliverance from
persecuting mobs into a haven for their family in the Rocky Mountains.
Elsie Nielson dreams of fulfillment for her husband, Jens, who
left Denmark as a farmer and has come to America to be a shepherd
of souls, a father to many more than their one little son and
foster daughter Bodil. Robert Pearce, a refugee from the factories
of England, defies the protective Captain Brown and his own hopelessly
crippled body by promising to walk every step of the way to Zion,
to reach his dream of being healed by the prophet.
-
- Death is a frequent traveling companion
along the deep-mud roads of Iowa, but John Brown is encouraged
by the mysterious woman, Angela Hopewell, apparently a midwife,
clearly a comforter. She is present at births, at the blanket-sides
of the sick, at the accidental shooting of a young boy. While
John wishes for the guiding and guarding angels promised by prophets,
Angela hovers in urgent concern, but the sufferers she attends
do not survive.
-
- Pearce lags further behind each day and
is saved by John Brown from hungry wolves, but John is puzzled
and alarmed to find Angela there also, as if she were simply
awaiting the outcome of the attack. At the campfire that evening,
Pearce's relieved friends merrily compete in song, telling their
own fanciful stories of escaping Old Man Death. John realizes
that their nemesis is not a fearsome Old Man at all. He has met
his hoped-for angel, and she is the Angel of Death.
-
- John orders Pearce to ride, but he is once
again walking only days after his rescue from the wolves. Struggling
on in the passion of his dream to take wing from his sufferings,
he casts aside his crutch, takes a few faltering steps unaided,
and falls. It is Angela who raises him to his full stature and
dances him away into another life.
-
- With rations failing, John regroups the
company -- determined that no more will fall to Angela. But many
stumble under privation and sorrow, and Caroline Grant's baby
falls ill with the cholera. Angela cannot accept John's offer
to sacrifice his own life in trade for the safety of the pioneers,
so he rides ahead to the valley for help, leaving them to face
the first falling snow in the Wyoming highlands.
-
- ACT II
-
- John and the rescuers are interrupted in
their return trip by the burial of Margaret Grant, but John must
break through the complaints and worries of 1947, '53, and '59
to reach the desperate handcart pioneers in '56.
-
- They are in a hopeless stupor of of starvation
and cold, and the rescuers impose a forced march of fifteen miles,
twenty-seven hours, over Rocky Ridge, the highest point on the
entire trail, to get them to a sheltered camp, where Jens and
Elsie Nielson bury their son and foster daughter. Jens' feet
freeze, and he begs Elsie to leave him in the snow to die, and
save her own life Angela bars John from helping -- he watches
as Elsie, declaring the "Zion is together, sometimes you
are helping others, other times they are helping you," lifts
her protesting husband onto the cart and pulls him through the
snow, with invisible help from Angela.
-
- John thinks he has won a victory, but hears
little Caddie Grant call out in alarm at her mother's collapse
and his fears rise again. "Will you take all the joy?"
he cries, and Angela catches John away to the top of Big Mountain,
where, first among the Mormon pioneers, he saw the Salt Lake
Valley with Orson Pratt in July of 1847.
-
- There he is reminded of the joy of the
Zion-dream, and witnesses Angela's awe of the fierce unity of
the 70,000 who followed that dream into the valley below. He
despairs of ever prevailing against his enemy until she reveals
that she was beaten long ago. "That's the reason you can
call me your friend." John submits to Angela's "rescue"
of the suffering Caroline Grant, trusting Angela that "dreams
are stronger than death." Caroline whispers into the ear
of her broken husband the dream they shared at the beginning
of the trail, to be all together in the valley, then Angela dances
her off. Jedediah bids farewell to Caddie and turns back to retrieve
his tiny Margaret. The company, bearing Caroline's coffin, gather
up their gear and march with solemn joy over the last rise. As
John Brown is about to crest that rise, Angela invites him to
join her in his final dance. And all enter their valley of peace.
-
Click for Lyrics to Act I
All lyrics © copyright 1995 Steven Kapp Perry, BMI. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Intermission
Click for Lyrics to Act II
All lyrics © copyright 1995 Steven Kapp Perry, BMI. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
If your group or theatrical company is interested in performing "The Trail
of Dreams," please contact the publisher;
Encore Performance Publishing
P. O. Box 692
Orem, UT 84059
(801) 225-0605
or email at Encoreplay@aol.com
To Order, Click Here
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