Hampton's Annie

HAMPTON'S ANNIE is a western set in late 1880 Colorado, and the arena is the coming of the railroad.

In the opening flashback, an imaginary African American actor named Albert (Bert) Brown, dressed as a railroad porter, sets up the story. The twin protagonists are a famous New York actress, Anna Carroll (prefers Annie), who is dedicated to seeking revenge for the civil war death of her father, and the man who caused that death, a railroad construction engineer from Georgia named Wade Clay.

With Bert's help, Annie tracks Clay to Colorado where he is in the middle of a railroad building race that involves Annie's brother. The plot thickens during a vaudeville show at the Alkazar Theater in Denver, followed by a disaster-filled train ride through the mountains which ends in Aspen, where Annie, despite her best efforts not to, falls in love with Clay - the man she has sworn to kill.

The array of idiosyncratic characters includes the richest man in America who wears a red wig from the Irish sailor's skit, an unintentionally earthy auburn-headed ingénue who ends badly, a mute deputy who has a well thought out game plan, a tobacco spitting sheriff who prefers to urinate out windows, and a monkey with an attitude named Monkey who comes from Milan, Italy.

There are period songs, comedic skits, a rigged prize fight, an arson set trestle fire, a pair of nasty stabbings, and a life and death locomotive chase that ends in the fast flowing, frigid river below a blown up railroad bridge.

In the end, the villains get their just deserts. On the stage, Bert, dressed as himself, sings Stephen Foster's song "Beautiful Dreamer," while, at the train station, boy gets girl (and vice versa). And, in melodramatic fashion, all is well that ends well, for the most part.