What with Elizabeth Warren's debate tonight on CSPAN and Obama's debate on Wednesday, also on CSPAN (for those of us without cable, the streaming version is the way to go), I thought tonight I would turn to a political bit of theatricality.
Yes, 1776 the musical. This first clip is sheer hilarity (from the movie version), casting Ben Franklin as Svengali:
Info about the show (and more clips) below the fleur-de-kos:
Sherman Edwards, a singer of pop-songs with several top ten hits in the late fifties and early sixties, spent several years developing lyrics and libretto for a musical based on the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Edwards recounted that, "I wanted to show [the founding fathers] at their outermost limits. These men were the cream of their colonies... They disagreed and fought with each other. But they understood commitment, and though they fought, they fought affirmatively."[2] Producer Stuart Ostrow recommended that librettist Peter Stone collaborate with Edwards on the book of the musical. Stone recalled, "The minute you heard ["Sit Down, John"], you knew what the whole show was.... You knew immediately that John Adams and the others were not going to be treated as gods, or cardboard characters, chopping down cherry trees and flying kites with strings and keys on them. It had this very affectionate familiarity; it wasn't reverential."[2] Adams, the outspoken delegate from Massachusetts, was chosen as the central character, and his quest to persuade all thirteen colonies to vote for independence became the central conflict.
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
"Sit Down, John":
"He Plays the Violin" starring Martha Jefferson:
The Do-Nothing Congress:
The Vote (Franklin still in Svengali mode):