Bringing Bobby Kennedy back to life in St. James Park
San Jose actor Jeffrey Brian Adams has played a lot of roles in his career, but his latest was the part of a lifetime. Of course, the lifetime in question belonged to Robert F. Kennedy.
Adams — who was born decades after Kennedy’s assassination in 1968 — recreated the speech the U.S. senator and presidential candidate gave 50 years ago at San Jose’s St. James Park on Saturday. It was a challenge and an honor to step into the role, Adams said.
“My main focus was trying to do the speech justice,” said Adams, a graduate of Bellarmine College Prep and Santa Clara University who will appear in ACT’s production of “A Walk on the Moon” this summer. “His words carry so much weight and are still relevant, 50 years later.”
No film of the speech appears to exist, but Adams studied an audio recording made that day to get down Kennedy’s specific accent and vocal pattern without veering into a “Saturday Night Live” caricature. Other than dressing in period clothing — a dark suit with a thin, striped tie — he didn’t do much to increase his physical resemblance to Kennedy, but he certainly captured the senator’s youthful spirit with the audience gathered at the St. James Park stage.
Adams said he was blown away by how many people were moved by the
re creation. People really got into it, shouting and responding to the speech as though it was 1968 all over again. A few people came up to Adams afterward to shake his hand and ask what he was running for — and one guy even called him “Bobby.”
“There were a few members of the crowd who were there in 1968 and were so grateful to be a part of the experience again,” Adams said. “That was special for me, to feel like a living example and reminder of such a rich part of our history as San Joseans and a nation.”
COMMUNITY FARM HIT BY THIEVES >> Veggielution, the community farm at Emma Prusch Farm Park in San Jose, was broken into over the weekend and thieves made away with several items, including the generator from the Eastside Grown Food Truck, two kitchen classroom generators, an orchard ladder, and a utility cart from the youth garden.
Spokeswoman Emily Schwing said the response from supporters who got word through email or on social media has been amazing with about $7,000 donated by Monday morning. Donations can be made at w w w.veggielution.org.
Veggielution hopes to have its truck up and running by Sunday, but the nonprofit needs electrical help to rewire the front of the truck where wires were cut and pulled out. The goal is to have everything ready for Earth Week activities starting April 17, when the farm will host teambuilding events for Applied Materials, the International Interior Design Association, and WIC.
ZOO DIRECTOR SAYS FAREWELL >> Happy Hollow Park & Zoo said goodbye Friday to Zoo Director Valerie Riegel, who was hired at the San Jose institution right out of Moorpark College in 1985. Riegel’s retirement party at the zoo’s Backyard Habitat drew a festive crowd that included zoo and city staff, family and friends, and even Gregg Owens, the former zoo director at Happy Hollow who hired her way back when.
“This place has been my heart and soul and you guys have all been a part of it,” Riegel said to the guests. “I know that this place is in the best of hands because I trained each and every one of you!”
Riegel received the American Association of Zoo Keepers’s Jean M. Hromadka Excellence in Animal Care Award in 2011. And if you’re wondering, the recent, tragic deaths of four miniature horses and a donkey had nothing to do with Riegel’s retirement, which had been in the works since last year.