Ned Donovan - Ithaca ‘12

Hey y’all,

So this weekend marks the closing of Ithaca College’s Mainstage production of the show “The Exonerated”.  This is a show about six people who were convicted guilty and sentenced to death in various parts of the country, and were subsequentially exonerated of all charges before they could be executed.  The show is a commentary on the broken nature of the legal system, and while it doesn’t call for an overhaul, it does seem to call for abolition of the death penalty.

After seeing the show, I don’t believe that I like the show as a whole all that much.  That being said, this production was beautiful, elegant, and utterly heartwrenching.  The entire cast was phenomenal and the direction by Cynthia Henderson just lent itself perfectly to the nature of the script.  Every member of the cast really excelled themselves into the character and told these stories as best as they could.

One of the characters in the show is a man named Kerry Max Cook who was wrongfully accused of raping and murdering a girl in Texas and sentenced to death.  Twenty Two years later he was released after DNA evidence showed that it wasn’t him.  The man who did it was not sentenced to death, and is now out of jail and free.  Tonight, October 11th, Kerry Max Cook was present at the production of “The Exonerated” and stayed afterwards to have a talkback Q and A about his experiences.  This man is amazing folks, he is a wonderful speaker, he is open and honest, and he is truly admirable for standing up and telling us his tale, and allowing us to tell his tale through the show.