She was a woman the whole world knew; she started fashion trends (Pillbox hats), style trends (colors like beige and cream), and raised awareness of the arts in a way no first lady had ever done. This was Jaqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onasis, the Queen of JFK’s Camelot. Yet, when not giving tours of the White House or winning the hearts of the French during a visit to Paris, Jackie was a very private person. She dodged the public and refused requests for exclusive interviews.
Tom Santopietro’s JBKO, now at the Revolution Stage Company, pulls back the curtain and gives us a look at the private Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onasis (her initials giving the play its title). In an amazing powerhouse performance by Yo Younger, we get to spend an evening with the Jackie the public never saw, She discusses, among many things, her work, before and after the White House, as an editor and photographer, her life with JFK, and her perpetual guilt that somehow she should have been able to save him. She smokes (though, never in public) because it helps to calm her nerves and she uses those oversized sunglasses as a shield so that people can’t see the real Jackie.
The play is set in her apartment in New York, brought to life by the simple yet effective design by the show’s director, Gary Powers, and wonderfully enhanced by Nathan Cox’s imagery shown on the upstage video wall. Under Power’s excellent direction, Yo Younger gives a tour-de-force performance as Jackie. Alone onstage for both acts, she shows what the term ‘stage presence’ means. Although quite different in appearance from Jackie herself, that is soon forgotten as she totally captures the essence of her persona. Before long, you start to feel like you are getting the personal interview she long denied the world. She exposes her faults, her dreams, her wonderfully dry sense of humor, her pains. Ms. Younger makes the transitions so seamless they feel totally natural. As she delves into the assassination of her husband, you can palpably feel her pain as she expresses her thoughts on what a waste of a life it was, with no major cause or reason behind it… just the act of a lone communist. I must confess: it brought tears to my eyes. This is the kind of performance that many never get the opportunity to see first-hand. What Yo Younger does with this role is a performance that should not be missed and I, for one, am thrilled that I experienced it.
JBKO runs only through March 29, 2026. Don’t let this one go by! For tickets and more information visit their website at RevolutionStageCompany.com