Overview
- Amanda Seyfried’s performance anchors Mona Fastvold’s biographical musical about Ann Lee and ecstatic Shaker worship, according to new capsule reviews.
- USA Today details which scenes draw from court records, newspapers and follower testimony, and which the filmmakers describe as “speculative history.”
- Composer Daniel Blumberg adapts traditional Shaker hymns with added claps, stomps and vocal textures, while Celia Rowlson-Hall’s choreography draws on historical depictions.
- The narrative covers Lee’s celibacy doctrine, multiple arrests for blasphemy and disturbing the peace, and a flock that Fastvold says swelled to roughly 6,000 at its peak.
- Current reporting underscores the sect’s decline, citing an NPR count of three Shakers remaining in Maine.