Tensions have been mounting. A confrontation that could have once been avoided is now inevitable. The two political leaders—Aaron Burr, vice president under Thomas Jefferson, and Alexander Hamilton, leader of the opposing Federalist party—meet across the Hudson River from Manhattan, in Weehawken, N.J. The pistols are presented and the two men ready themselves. One of the seconds calls for the two men to present arms, and they take aim. Hamilton’s shot goes high, missing Burr. Through the smoke from Hamilton’s pistol and the glare of the hot July sun, Burr takes further aim, and then…

Then what? As we’ve all learned (and perhaps forgotten), Aaron Burr took his shot, hitting Hamilton low in the torso, the bullet hitting his spine, disabling him, and damaging his liver. Hamilton dies the next day. Burr—the ardent patriot, social progressive, revered statesman—is condemned to live in infamy as the man who killed Alexander Hamilton. His political career never recovers.

But what happens if you’re a writer and playwright with an interest in alternate history—changing what did happen to what could happen—and deeply engaged with this now mythical confrontation between two of the Founding Fathers? This is what audience members at the premiere of James Patrick Kelly’s new play, “The Duel,” will find out when the production opens at the West End Studio Theater in Portsmouth this Friday, Jan. 13. The play runs through Jan. 22 before going to the Palace Theatre in Manchester.

“I’ve always felt sort of odd when people talk about the Founding Fathers as if they were all sort of secular saints, who knew everything that was going to happen and could see the future,” said Kelly in a phone interview from his home in Nottingham. “I wanted to write a play that would sort of look at the Founding Fathers as human beings, and there are no two Founding Fathers who prove this better than Hamilton and Burr.”

Using alternate history is a way to talk about current history and current events, as well. Kelly first got the idea to write about the Duel shortly after the 2004 election. While he admits that he hopes it accomplishes some level of political commentary, Kelly stresses that “The Duel” does not function as an allegory and it is not meant to directly parallel current events in the country.

“I didn’t set out to write a didactic play where the audience can say to themselves, ‘Oh my gosh, he’s talking about George Bush,’ or, ‘Oh my gosh, he’s talking about Gore or Kerry,’” he says. “What I am trying to talk about politically is that there was no golden age of politics in this country. From the get-go, things were being bought and sold, compromises were being made. The Founding Fathers, although often brilliant, were not saints, and they did not look into the future with prescient eyes. There’s a line in the play that I’m actually quite proud of, where Aaron Burr says, ‘The Constitution isn’t an agreement; it’s an argument.’ I think that’s right. Every generation gets the Constitution it deserves, and it’s not so much a roadmap to the future as an outline of possibilities.”    

The duel of 1804 has entered into our popular consciousness, taking on an almost mythical quality. Every American learns about it in school and remembers at least enough to understand references to it, whether they’re made as trivia quiz answers in “Got Milk?” ads of the late 1990s or farcical rap videos on Saturday Night Live (check out “Lazy Sunday” at www.youtube.com, if only for the line, “You can call us Aaron Burr, the way we’re droppin’ Hamiltons”). For most people, though, the details of the infamous duel itself and its historical context and significance have become blurred, if they were ever clear to begin with.

A refresher course: Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton were two of the most prominent and respected politicians of the age. Both men had distinguished themselves during the Revolutionary War. Hamilton helped draft the Constitution and contributed to the Federalist Papers, in addition to establishing the National Bank and leading the Federalist Party. Aaron Burr had been elected senator of New York (beating out Hamilton’s father-in-law for the position) and was vice president at the time of the duel, though he had fallen out of Thomas Jefferson’s favor after opposing the president’s attempts to assert an un-Constitutional degree of control over the judicial branch.

The country itself was in conflict in the wake of the Louisiana Purchase. The Federalist states of the Northeast were contemplating secession from the Union if Jefferson’s plan to expand slavery into the newly acquired territory went ahead as planned. Hamilton and Burr, while both strongly opposed to the institution of slavery, differed greatly in their opinions on the matter. Burr, a Republican, believed that states enter into the Constitution voluntarily and can therefore withdraw from the Union if they so choose; Hamilton, a Federalist, believed in the supreme importance of central government and believed the Union must be maintained, regardless of any opposition individual states might have against specific government policies.

While both men were leaders of their respective parties and were deeply involved with the political struggles of the day, the conflict that led eventually to their duel had very little direct political motivation. The two men—who were well-acquainted, had been on amicable terms at one point and had even worked together on certain law cases—had had a falling out. Hamilton (who, as some evidence suggests, had never liked Burr and had made it somewhat of a quest to frustrate the man’s personal and political ambitions) had been recorded in certain papers as having made some insulting comments regarding Burr. Burr asked for an apology from Hamilton, which was denied, and further letters were exchanged, until Burr, believing it was the only way to reclaim his honor, challenged Hamilton to a duel.

“It’s kind of astonishing for us to see these two men, leaders of their own parties, shooting it out in a gunfight at the Founding Father corral,” Kelly notes.

The play attempts to show the humanity of men who are too often held up as infallible, godlike figures who immaculately conceived this country out of courage and idealism. What the play presents to the audience is the passion, tensions, obsessions and conflicts that really drove the early leaders of our country. “The Duel,” as a historical event and a play, makes plainly evident to people the true nature of our early history and the environment our country was born into.

Capturing both the personalities of the two duelers and the political climate they lived in required extensive research on Kelly’s part. He spent months reading biographies of Burr and Hamilton, accounts of the duel, and an extensive amount of personal correspondence from both men.

“The first act is utterly factual,” says the writer and playwright. “It’s drawn from letters and other original documents. Obviously I had to make some dialogue up, but I think I pretty well captured what the run-up to this duel was, and at least hinted at some notions as to why it was fought, the personal animosity between these two men. When I talk about this it always sounds sort of dry, but I actually think it’s kinda sexy.”

Kelly, a Hugo Award-winning science fiction writer, let his imagination take over in the second act. Veering sharply away from historical fact at the end of the first act, the second half of the play presents Kelly’s imagined course of events. The Northeast has seceded from the Union, with a civil war ensuing 50 years before the North and South would actually clash over the issue of slavery and states’ rights. The fates of Burr, Hamilton and the nation have taken a drastic detour from the historical record. Set in Nottingham in 1810, the second act concerns the Kelsey family, who manage a tavern on the major road between Portsmouth and Concord. Living in turbulent times, the experience of the Kelsey family shows what happens when the dreams and failures of “Great Men” of history come crashing into the everyday lives of common people.

Researching and writing bring a play to the page, but it takes the involvement of many more people to bring it from the page to the stage. With a completed script and a grant from the New Hampshire State Council on the Arts, it fell to the New Hampshire Theatre Project to bring “The Duel” to life. Blair Hundertmark, the producing director for NHTP and fresh off a well-received turn as the lead in “The Elephant Man,” began working with Kelly to make “The Duel” more than a script.

“It’s been great working with Jim, especially on a new play,” Hundertmark said during a break from rehearsal on a recent Wednesday night. “There’s sort of this unwritten code that you don’t mess with a playwright’s words. With Jim being involved, though, we could both work on the script as the production went along; we’d say, ‘This line doesn’t quite work,’ and Jim could change it right there. It’s been wonderful to have him so involved.”

“I’ve seen this play develop like an old-fashioned Polaroid,” Kelly concurs. “First you see the blotches of color, and all of a sudden it starts to sharpen, and it’s coming into focus now, and I think to myself, ‘Wow! This is so much better than it was when it started.’ The words mean so much more to me now that I’m hearing characters say them.” 

Wednesday night was the first rehearsal with the cast of accomplished local actors attempting to run through Act One without scripts. At times unsure of their entrance cues, fidgeting in their stage placement, calling out “line” when the words were lost to them, it was still clear how far into these characters they had gone, and how much farther they had to go.

“You have to get beyond the words,” Hundertmark said to the whole cast after they completed a run through. The challenge for the actors, as Hundertmark reminded them, was to really live their roles and to convince the audience of the possibility and immediacy of the play’s reality.

“When you said, ‘There is the boat,’ Steve,” Hundertmark said, addressing Steve Bornstein, who plays Aaron Burr. “That was the first time I saw the boat, too. We all saw the boat.”

What is it like for the actors to attempt to live lives that have already been lived; to create on stage a person who has actually existed? Are there specific challenges in bringing to life events that are familiar to the audience, if only vaguely, before they even enter the theater?

“There’s that temptation to let the historical existence of this person affect your performance, but it shouldn’t,” Bornstein said regarding his portrayal of Burr. “The historical person is just a footnote to your performance. The idea of good acting is that you don’t create a character, but you find the motivation of a person. You play the intent of the person, not a character.”

“You always do your best to give an honest portrayal of the person,” said Tommy Olson, who plays Judge Pendleton, Hamilton’s close friend. “That being said, I am going to put my own spin on it.”

“The Duel” succeeds not only in showing the way the decisions of “Great Men” impact the everyday lives of common people, but also in showing the people who influence these men: the people they lived with and came home to, their friends and wives.

“Mine is not a big part, but my character shows the humanity of these men,” said Kathy Somssich, who plays Hamilton’s wife, Eliza. “I feel like my character is there to make (Hamilton) feel guilty. It takes the story beyond the history books and shows that these were real people who dealt with marital problems, financial problems and everything else people face in their lives.”

Kevin Collins, who plays Alexander Hamilton, reflected on how his experience with “The Duel” has affected his perception of Hamilton, Burr and American history more generally.

“I have a much better respect, and I am humbled at the passion and conviction that these Founding Fathers had in developing this country. You see just how often the decisions they made for the future of the country came from a notion of bettering themselves.”

Bornstein echoed this sentiment. “I think a huge part of political motivation is personal aspiration.”

Running through the first act a second time, it is clear how the actors are constantly changing and improving their performance. Each time they say their lines, they become better acquainted with their character, and the person they are portraying becomes more believable, even in flannel shirts and sneakers.

As the cast of “The Duel” attempts to bring history to life and make it a vibrant and relatable part of people’s lives, there are those who attempt to alter the way history is perceived and recorded: people like the members of the Aaron Burr Association, whose stated goal is “to keep alive the memory of Colonel Aaron Burr ... and to secure for him the honor and respect which are due him as one of the leading figures of his age” (www.aaronburrassociation.org). Members of the ABA have contacted Hundertmark and plan to attend a performance of “The Duel.”

“Our major concern with a play like this is just that it portray the duel and Burr accurately and fairly,” said Stuart Johnson, president general of the ABA, in a phone interview. “Historians seem to agree that Burr didn’t have a mean bone in his body. He did not instigate Hamilton.”

Johnson, who is distantly related to Burr, has been a member of the ABA for 35 years and has been the Association’s President since 1995. The Association aims to defend Burr’s character and combat the popular opinion of Burr, his role in history and the duel. To this aim, the Association holds annual meetings, publishes a newsletter and actually organized a meticulously researched and planned re-enactment of the duel at Weehawken in 2004, with descendants of Burr and Hamilton standing in for their ancestors.

“We don’t seek to cover up anything,” said Johnson. “We’re after the truth. After that, let the chips fall where they may.”

When asked what he would most hope to emphasize about Burr’s life and legacy, Johnson responded, “That he was a proven patriot, a leading advocate in the United States for the education of women, and a true egalitarian.”

More than 200 years after the two men met with pistols drawn, Burr, Hamilton and their duel still occupy a prominent place in America’s history and self-image. When Kelly’s play premieres this Friday night, it will be another affirmation of the power of history to capture the modern imagination. It will be a further exploration of the extent to which we can ever really know our own pasts. It will show that there is always more to understand about events that are seemingly cut and dry. And it will prove that people who are dead and gone are really neither dead nor gone, but still living in our popular consciousness, affecting the way we see our nation and ourselves.


The Duel
presented by New Hampshire Theatre Project; written by James Patrick Kelly; directed by Blair Hundertmark; starring Steve Bornstein as Aaron Burr and Kevin Collins as Alexander Hamilton, with Joseph Chase, Tom Olson, Lisa Richardson, and Kathy Somssich.

Live music and soundscape composed by Jose Duque.

Supported by a N.H. State Council on the Arts New Works Grant.

At West End Studio Theatre, 959 Islington St., Portsmouth, through Jan. 22. Shows are Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m. and Sundays at 2 p.m. Tickets are $20 and $15.