Welcome to TWLTW, a special weekly interruption of the DKos community series Morning Feature. Here, we celebrate Things large and small that We Learned This Week. If you've learned something recently, or would like to, this is a good place for you!
A few nights ago I watched a movie called "Up In The Air" with one George Clooney who travels more than 300 days a year, firing people. Or, as he would say, "helping people transition to the future." I had heard it was a good movie, but what I saw onscreen completely overwhelmed me.
A few days ago, I was reminded here about something called the Federal Theater Project, a WPA program that hired artists to produce plays and musicals. One of their projects was the "Living Newspaper," in which they told the stories of the day as theatrical plays, with characters, scripts, pro. lighting, sets, and props.
Much like Up In The Air did for me, 2 nights ago.
More on the FTP, and it's influence on today, below.
Disclaimer
This is one of those topics that is so large and so rich that I could never do it justice in a diary of this length and format. If you find theater history, or US Political history, interesting in any depth, you may find it rewarding to click through the links and read some of the original sources for yourself.
Federal Theater Project
The FTP was created as part of the New Deal Federal Number One projects that created art, music, theater, writing, and historical record-keeping efforts in order to employ out-of-work professionals in their areas of expertise, and, in the case of the FTP, to create high quality and accessible live theater productions. For 4 years, it succeeded.
Contributions
The list of artists employed by the FTP is long and impressive, many of whom, however, hit their stride after their time in the FTP. This govt. program supported artists and administrators who during their time in it, and onward to today, greatly influenced the course and quality of theater arts in America. I wonder what our modern Broadway and national theater life might be like had these people not been supported in their work.
For example: Orson Welles, Arthur Miller, W.E.B. Dubois (authored a play, Haiti with image below), Hallie Flanagan, T.S. Eliot, Marc Blitzstein, Elia Kazan, Will Geer (Grandpa from The Waltons), Howard Da Silva, Abe Feder (one of the first full-time lighting designers), and in an ironic twist (appropriate for the theater) Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe. But, the thousands of unknowns, people who hoisted scenery, placed props, acted bit parts, drove trucks from town to town, stamped tickets, etc... all the people who benefited from these productions that made live theater possible during the Great Depression, those people are part of this list as well.
Not to mention those who saw the plays and musicals. Program administrator Hallie Flanagan had a vision to bring live theater to the people who couldn't afford to travel to see it, and with the resources and like-minded professionals in her circle, sent tours out into the rural areas of the country, bringing theater to tens of thousands who had never seen a live show before in their lives. Regarding that, and their general impact, some descriptivestatistics:
- Many of the shows were free, some in urban areas cost as much as $.40 (in NYC), with children's tickets at $.15.
- 25 million people in 40 states witnessed an FTP production. By it's second year of productions, FTP shows were pulling in 150,000 patrons each week.
- 10,000 to 12,000 per year people were on FTP payroll during it's 4 years of existence.
- 1,200 (more or less) different works were performed.
- 309 were of new productions, financed by FTP.
- At least 850 classics and preexisting works were also performed, some attracting notoriety such as Blitsztien's Cradle Will Rock and Welle's "Black" or "Voodoo" Macbeth.
Specific Notoriety
Some of these productions garnered more national, and congressional, attention than others. In this section, a few interesting details about a few of them.
Voodoo Macbeth
Produced by John Houseman, who hired a 20 year old Orson Welles to direct it (off the success of his recently directed and puppet-filled Faust, and Shadow radio series), this Macbeth was fully cast with African-Americans and Caribbean nationals. The set design was meant to evoke Africa and the Caribbeans and prominently featured an enormous human skeleton against a jungle background. The only existing video of the production can be found here, in a documentary about the Great Depression relief programs that includes a few minutes from the show in it's archival footage.
The show''s Playbill cover and a still imagecan be seen at these links.
Revolt of the Beavers
FTP also ran a large and popular children's theater department. One of their most notorious productions turned out to be the Revolt of the Beavers, described here, in this way:
...society is run by a cruel beaver chief. "The Chief" forces the other beavers to work endlessly on the "busy wheel," turning bark into food and clothing, then hoards everything for himself and his friends. With the help of the children, a beaver named Oakleaf organizes his brethren, overthrows The Chief, and establishes a society where everything is shared. The show played to packed houses during its brief New York City run, but its message drew fire. Theater critic Brooks Atkinson labeled it "Marxism à la Mother Goose."
Living Newspapers
One of the (arguably) greatest original contributions to theater made by the FTP was Hallie Flanagan's Living Newspapers. Living Newspaper staff literally clipped articles from newspapers around the country, built single scene and more complex dramatic live enactments of them, and produced them around the country. At this link, for example, you can see a still frame of one production in which a mother appears in front of a magistrate, explaining (remember, this is the Great Depression) that she drowned her infant child because she could not afford to feed it. Needless to say, not all were this bleak, but they did attract the attention of conservative politicos who were not interested in the negative consequences of the Great Depression being presented to ever wider audiences of potentially motivated and desperate Americans. This is one I have seen in high schools, where English and theater classes actually clip newspaper articles, write scripts in the first person from characters' POV, and peform them. Some great stuff going on here, still.
Cradle Will Rock
Enter the Cradle Will Rock controversy. A direct shot at capitalism's flaws and faults, it became the show famous for having been the only theater production shut down by the federal government (armed guards stood at the doors of the theater on opening night, preventing anyone, actor or audience, from entering the theater). Tim Robbins wrote and directed a movie, Cradle Will Rock, about this very event. Said Robbins about this era, his film, and the relationship of the government (not just federal, but all levels of government from city council to mayor to governor, etc...) to the arts in the US:
There will always be humorless, morally righteous pepole in government who will react negatively to courageous expression - one can only hope that their actions will create further inspiration for the artist. Out of the flames of controversy and oppression can come great work and unbridled expression.
The film is one of my personal all-time favorites. I rank it with Casablanca in my top 3. But, I'm a history and theater nut, so you're mileage may vary!
House Committee On Un-American Activities
This committee was not created by McCarthy, but many years earlier by Martin Dies who, early in it's existence, used it to target the perceived pro-communist and socialist promotion of the Federal Theater Project. Hallie Flanagan was called to testify. She was accused of being anti-American by disgruntled FTP former employees, and by Dies for having studied with Stanislavsky in Europe on a Guggenheim Fellowship (other Guggenheim recipients included Aaron Copland and Linus Pauling, btw). The following is an exchange in Robbins' film, between Flanagan and committee member Joe Starnes during her brief appearance before the committee. I can't confirm it is an actual transcript, but the Wikipediapage certainly supports that assertion, as it nails Starnes for publicly embarrassing himself by accusing Marlowe of Communism and Euripedes of "class warfare":
Dies: You have reached approximately 25% of our population with your plays.
Hallie: Something like that.
Starnes: Mrs. Flanagan, you said in Theatre Arts Monthly, and these are your words that I'm quoting: "The workers theatres intend to make a social structure without the help of money, and this ambition alone infests their undertaking with a certain Marlowesque madness." You are quoting from this Marlowe. Is he a Communist?
Hallie: I am very sorry. I was quoting from Christopher Marlowe.
Starnes: Tell us who this Marlowe is so we can get the proper reference, because that is all we want to do.
Hallie: Put in the record that he was the greatest dramatist in the period of Shakespeare, immediately preceding Shakespeare.
Never mind the fact that Professor Flanagan was exposing the futility of creating theater works without proper funding of some sort, an argument Starnes and Dies would have certainly understand if not agreed with. The real argument to be had was where do these funds properly come from, and that argument was entirely sidelined by ideology and witch-hunting.
The disgruntled clerk who felt the hundreds of unemployed theater workers who passed by her window every day looking for work were full of Communism and sympathy for it appeared before the committee for 2 full days. Hallie Flanagan was given only a few hours, late in the day on one afternoon.
And that's how we get back to Shakespeare, and Marlowe. And, in an extended and extrapolated way for me, Up In The Air, but more directly, Rent, American Idiot, Avenue Q, In The Heights, Next To Normal, and so many others that would have found a comfortable home in the FTP, its Living Newspapers, tours, and it's commitment to theater that should be "free, adult, and uncensored."
Final Act
Also from Tim Robbin's Cradle Will Rock:
Rose: Are we through? Is this it?
O'Hara: Should I be looking for a job?
Hallie: We've got another year if we fight.
Rose: You know I can understand the puritans. I can understand the politics but I guess I don't understand the passion of it. The intensity of the anger.
Hallie: It's not just anger. It's fear.
O'Hara: Fear?
Hallie: Mr. O'Hara, have you ever heard of Michael Grunwald?
O'Hara: Was he a Communist?
Hallie: No. Mr. De Rohan?
De Rohan: Michael Grunwald, an historian. Elizabethan England. Not a Communist as far as I know.
Hallie: Mr. O'Hara, have you read any of his books?
O'Hara: No, Congressman Flanagan, I skipped that course.
Hallie: But you know your history of Elizabethan England?
O'Hara: Well, yes, from Shakespeare.
Hallie: From a playwright. I see. Mr. O'Hara, who was Richard III?
O'Hara: A humpback and a killer!
Hallie: Mr. De Rohan, what is Michael Grunwald's opinion of Richard III?
De Rohan: Much maligned, and a great ruler.
Hallie: And yet this Shakespeare has written a play that is still performed while Mr. Grunwald's books gather dust. Would you consider that unfair, Mr. De Rohan?
De Rohan: Why yes. I would say this Mr. Shakespeare should be investigated.
Hallie: And if all else fails, we can remove his words. Burn them.
pause
Rose: We're not painting pretty pictures. It must scare the hell out of them.
O'Hara: Well, the plays are written. They're here forever.
Hallie: I hope they are. Federal Theater is going to end. But theater's going to be better off. We've launched a ship. A grand and glorious ship.
Go see a show. Really. If you can't afford Broadway, try a community theater. And if you really want to support something important, go see a local high school musical or play. Even if you know no one at the school.
TWLTW
- Larry King really did/does prefer Ryan Seacrest to replace him at CNN. "If he has a great interest in politics," that is. If he had a great interest in politics, though, wouldn't he have done something with it by now?
- One of the many reasons I have a crush on Rachel Maddow:
When your positions are never questioned, you’re never forced to develop strong logic to back them up. When your arguments are never challenged, you don’t ever have to improve them, you don’t ever have to cast out arguments of yours that don’t make sense, or learn how to deal with evidence that appears to contradict your conclusions. That’s why I regret that we don’t have more conservatives on this show. Because, I do have a point of view, of course, but I happen to like talking to people with whom I disagree. Both because it is fun and selfishly because it makes my arguments better. On the right, the downside for conservatives of their being a huge pre-fab conservative media infrastructure is that conservatives sometimes grown inside that bubble cannot survive outside it.
-Rachel Maddow on Sharon Angle’s interviews with local Nevada broadcast journalists June 30, 2010
- Coyote Ugly: 2 young children have been mauled by coyotes in suburban communities north of NYC (Rye, to be specific). Local officials have been on the airwaves saying, "This is something we are going to have to live with. The coyotes are here to stay." If attacked, we are advised to blow an airhorn as they are sensitive to sound, in the absence of an airhorn, kicking the coyote in the face may deter it. I wonder if the vuvuzela horns coming from my 5.1 Sony speakers might work? A reminder, some coyotes made it into Central Park and other areas of Manhattan last fall.
- Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission
How 'bout
this?:
What these hearings offered instead were intelligent questions, a refusal to be snookered by witnesses, and a kind of understated pointedness that was more effective than a dozen angry diatribes. The commissioners may not have gotten all the answers they sought, but they were genuinely trying to get answers, instead of preening for the cameras. There was a seriousness of purpose about their effort that has been lacking in most of the hearings in Washington that have tackled the financial crisis.
Will wonders ever cease?
The hearings in question were those held by the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, charged with investigating the causes and run-up to, yes, the financial crisis. While it is possible that their conclusions may have little impact on short-term policy and legislation (the reform bill may be moved on before their report is published) it is being designed to be released similarly to the 9/11 Commission report, so that lessons may be learned and disseminated to everyone interested. Maybe that will help. The Commission's chair, Phil Angelides, who was once called a "chowder head" in an email by Enron's Director for State Govt. Affairs when he was California's State Treasurer, had this to say about his observations from that chair:
I have been taken aback at the extent to which...with so many of our witnesses, when it comes to assessing responsibility, all fingers point away from themselves. And the way we forgot some fundamental lessons about balance between private enterprise and public good.
The author of the piece concludes with this observation:
If nothing else, the commission’s final report should be a doozy. For once, I think we’re all going to learn something.
And, that's a week I'm looking forward to. The Commission's final report is due out in 6 months. I'll keep an eye out for it.
What Did You Learn This Week?