This Day in Theater History (‘1776’ Opens in New Era of Revolution)

March 16, 1969—After a decade of striving to bring 1776 to Broadway, its creators were annoyed by any suggestion that their musical about the turbulent creation of the Declaration of Independence was out of step with a new generation that had just made Hair a hit. They felt that, rather than passing, their time had arrived. Thousands of theatergoers—not to mention three Tony Awards (including Best Musical)--proved them right. By the time its extraordinary run was over, 1776 had gone on to 1,217 performances in three different Broadway theaters.

The musical did not simply humanize the signers of the Declaration of Independence, welcome though that may have been. It also clearly struck a chord with audiences without being politically incorrect. For theatergoers beset everywhere by troubling and seemingly new questions on the meaning and justice of the American experiment, it showed that even during the nation’s birth, its “fathers” (just the appropriate word, in Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address)  wrestled with issues of race, in the form of slavery; an earlier deeply divisive war, a revolution probably supported by no more than one-third of the inhabitants of the time; determined right-wing opponents (and, in articulate conservative John Dickinson, a sort of forerunner of William F. Buckley Jr.); and, in the form of John Adams’ fiercely intelligent spouse Abigail, wives dissatisfied with their lot in a changing world.

Yet 1776 did not make the mistake of another history-based Broadway musical from the year before, Maggie Flynn, about the New York City Draft Riots of 1863, in providing no significant respite from material already inherently depressing. (See my prior post on the latter.) Onetime schoolteacher Sherman Edwards composed enough songs with bounce and light to balance out undeniably darker fare such as “Molasses to Rum to Slaves,” about the “triangle trade” among Africa, the North and the South that sustained slavery. And, of course, it featured a happy ending.

The film version, released three years later, can stand as a fair proxy for the original Broadway production, as it featured the same director and most of the same cast. (The most significant exception to the latter was Blythe Danner, who, in the role of Martha Jefferson, had replaced Betty Buckley, whose debut on Broadway turned out to be an accurate promise for a fine career in musical theater.)

I came to know 1776 late in elementary school, when I repeatedly played the movie soundtrack and hunted down the script. At a pretty decisive point in my own education, when I became extremely interested in history, it opened a door into aspects of American history that I had not known.

The libretto by Peter Stone (who would go on to write another book for a musical that strove for historical accuracy, but was much less financially successful: Titanic) did an excellent job of detailing Adams’ irascibility, Thomas Jefferson’s taciturnity, Ben Franklin’s bonhomie—and the strong yen for women that, whether in marriage (Adams and Jefferson) or outside (Franklin), animated all three. To be sure, it took a couple of large stabs at dramatic license to heighten the suspense of the show (in real life, the crafting of the Declaration was a formality after the epic battle in the Continental Congress to pass the resolution for independence, and the signing took place over a period of months rather than a single day), and at least one unjustifiable mischaracterization (of the solemn Virginia firebrand Richard Henry Lee as a goof, which I discussed in this post).

But musicals can—and they have—been far, far less historically accurate than this. For instance, another musical about this crucial year in American history, Rodgers and Hart’s Dearest Enemy, took a real incident (a Quaker woman who, through hospitality to General Howe, slowed down the British pursuit of the Continental Army out of New York) and added quite a bit of fanciful trappings. I suspect that quite a few fans of the show, like me, became fascinated enough by what they saw on screen or stage to follow up in reading about the actual history.

I missed the much-praised 1997 Roundabout Theatre revival starring Brent Spiner. But the show has become a staple of regional productions all around the country. In recent years, as Americans have endured the spectacle of a deadlocked Congress, more than a few people have discovered fresh meaning in the opening scene of the play, when Adams, his patience exhausted by the slow progress of his attempts to move independence along, lashes out memorably with: “I have come to the conclusion that one useless man is a disgrace, that two are called a law firm, and that three or more become a Congress!”

Song Lyric of the Day (From “1776,” The Tune That Richard Nixon Nixed)

“To the right, ever to the right

Never to the left, forever to the right

We have gold, a market that will hold

Tradition that is old, a reluctance to be bold.”—“Cool, Cool, Considerate Men,” from 1776, book by Peter Stone, music and lyrics by Sherman Edwards (1969)

For a long time, I remembered incorrectly the title of this song, substituting “Conservative” for “Considerate”—but you really can’t blame me.

First, there are those lyrics—which, the intention of the Second Continental Congress delegates who sing it in the musical to the contrary, are less about reason than about reactionary tendencies.

Second, though I’ve seen the film 1776 a half-dozen times since its release in 1972, it was only about a year ago, when I caught it again on Turner Classic Movies, that I saw this song performed. It had been included in the original Broadway show, but didn’t make it into the finished film. And therein lies a tale in itself, exciting equal parts dark humor, pathos and terror, because it involves an American President at the height of his power: Richard Nixon.

Wary Warner and Tricky Dick

The film adaptation of 1776 was the last major production to be associated with Jack L. Warner, perhaps the most colorful member of the siblings that ran Warner Brothers in its glory years in the Thirties and Forties. On Broadway, the musical ran for more than 1,200 performances, netting a Tony as best musical.

The 79-year-old Warner, now an independent producer, saw a chance to burnish credits that already included such triumphs as Yankee Doodle Dandy, My Fair Lady, and Camelot. He did everything he could to duplicate the play’s success, hiring just about every member of the original cast (with the notable exception of Betty Buckley as Martha Jefferson, replaced by Blythe Danner) and sticking as close as possible to the original book of the musical by Peter Stone.

With one exception…

Warner took the film to the White House, where he previewed it for his friend Richard M. Nixon. (Remember that Warner was a throwback to the days when studio heads tended to be politically conservative, unlike today.)

Previously, Nixon had gotten a special performance at the White House of the stage version—the first time a Broadway musical had ever been staged at the President’s mansion in its entirety. At that time, much to the astonishment of cast members, he stood up and applauded at the end of “Cool, Cool Considerate Men.”

At some point, though, either while watching the film or very shortly afterward, Tricky Dick itched, glowered, and got that puss on his face that bothered so many viewers when he debated Jack Kennedy in 1960.

What had happened? Maybe prior objections of some members of his administration and Secret Service detail to this song and to the anti-war “Mama, Look Sharp” (songwriter Sherman Edwards had turned them down) had finally begun to register.

But in the commentary for the DVD release a few years ago, Peter Stone suggested an alternative that makes more sense—at least because it involved more immediate cause and effect. It involved a pain-in-the-neck cast member whose politics annoyed the President.

A Not-So-Fun-Loving Ben Franklin

Though most original cast members had been retained, producers had given serious thought to getting another Ben Franklin. Howard Da Silva had been wonderful in the role on Broadway, but behind the scenes he had given the show’s creators all-around agita.

The actor’s heart attack, suffered at the time of the recording of the original-cast album, could have given the producers an out had they wished. They could have said that uncertainty about his health was spelling trouble with the insurance companies who made filming possible. But the ruse would have been too transparent.

Da Silva caught onto their unease and implored them to cast him. He loved his great part, of course, but he also saw his appearance on film as a vindication of sorts for his refusal to “name names” before the House Committee on Un-American Activities, which had resulted in his blacklisting by Hollywood. Even his appearances onscreen in the 1960s, when the blacklist was lifted, had been infrequent and low-profile.

In short, Da Silva couldn’t bear to pass up a plum role. He promised to be on his best behavior, and, throughout the filming, he was as good as his word.

But fish gotta swim and birds gotta fly, and Da Silva, liberal/leftist that he was, couldn’t abide the idea of the current occupant of the White House. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, he believed, Nixon wasn’t just a politician with views that differed from his own, but the demagogue who had whipped up Californians and the nation into hysteria about Communism.

In other words, Da Silva concluded, Nixon was directly responsible for his unemployment during the blacklist era.

And so, the day after the performance at the White House, there was Da Silva, bound and determined that the President wouldn’t ruin other lives as he had his own, joining a line of anti-Vietnam picketers outside the executive mansion, where Nixon, Haldeman, Ehrlichman and their whole gang could see him.

Nixon’s appointments calendar shows that he dined with Warner two months before the film’s release on November 7. By this time, the President’s paranoia had been ramped up to a fever pitch by the effort to win a second term and to silence critics of his Vietnam policy (not to mention two inquisitive young whelps from the Washington Post asking questions about a third-rate break-in at the Watergate Hotel). As a favor to Nixon, Warner edited out the scene.

Fat White Guys in Wigs: A Formula for Success?

If he had wanted to, I suppose, Warner could have reasoned that the scene, featuring a minuet among the anti-independence forces in the Continental Congress, was terribly slow, not helped much by chunky middle-aged actors in wigs.

This was not a formula for success in a film that, unlike most musicals in the genre’s golden age, leaned far more heavily on words than moving images. You can bet your bottom dollar that he must have wondered if 18th-century feminine attire could allow for the likes of Cyd Charisse.

But in reality, Warner’s move was nothing but a cave-in to a powerful man. Or, as he put it: “He who fights and runs away lives to fight another day."

There the matter would have ended, with the footage irretrievably lost. But Warner’s loss of his former might and power in the industry (a situation that would be paralleled within two years by Nixon’s fall from grace) actually ensured that the scene would not be destroyed.

You see, in his salad days, as head of his family-run studio, Warner had customarily destroyed unused footage. A prime example of this was George Cukor’s sterling 1954 version of A Star is Born, starring Judy Garland. Despite ecstatic previews, Warner Brothers execs felt that the long running time would limit showings of the film and, thus, box office.

It was bad enough that the consequent cuts—two musical numbers and some crucial dramatic scenes—probably deprived Judy Garland of a Best Actress Oscar. But much of the footage fell permanently by the wayside, too. Years later, when the film was restored, much of this footage could not be re-inserted as originally shot, but had to feature dialogue running over production stills that represented the only visual record of what had been deleted.

I’m not going to argue here that “Cool, Cool Considerate Men” is a golden find compared with Garland’s show-stopping “Lose That Long Face.” But it did represent the one point in the film where the other side of the story of independence was told (even though that side was treated satirically).

Now, no longer heading a studio, Warner had no say on what happened to the footage—which, in this instance, the film’s editor put into unmarked boxes and buried in what Dick Cheney (a later “cool, cool considerate man”) might call “a secure, undisclosed location.” That location turned out to be 645 feet below ground in a salt mine warehouse near Lyons, Kansas. It was eventually rediscovered in readying the DVD release.

Today's GOP Reenacts Discarded Continental Congress Scenario

Today, on Capitol Hill, the GOP seems hell-bent on staging its own contemporary version of “Cool, Cool Considerate Men.”

Again, there’s a mystical, misplaced faith in “the market.”

Again, the leaders of the right-wing would rather go “never to the left,” no matter the circumstances affecting the country nor the real risk to their survival as a national party.

Most shamefully, there is “a reluctance to be bold,” even though the virtually unprecedented challenges facing the nation often require nothing less.

The irony in all of this is that the leader of the “Cool, Cool Considerate Men” in the Second Continental Congress, John Dickinson, later left by the wayside his “reluctance to be bold.” It wasn’t just, as 1776 indicated, that even though he couldn’t sign the Declaration of Independence, he joined the Continental Army to fight the British government he had once loyally believed in.

No, after the war—when he went back to Philadelphia, this time as a delegate to the Constitutional Convention from Delaware—Dickinson showed that he was a Burkean conservative—opposed to “change” but not to “reform.”

The convention almost foundered because of the split between large states, who wanted proportional representation in Congress, and small states, who wanted an equal number of votes for each state.

Then Dickinson advocated a solution that had never been tried before, but proved a brilliant solution to the problem at hand. It was a bicameral, or two-house, legislature in which the House of Representatives would be apportioned by population while the Senate would contain equal numbers for each state.

The idea came to be eagerly embraced not just within the federal branch or even by the individual states (Nebraska remains the lone holdout for a unicameral legislature) but even among foreign governments.

Today’s Republicans would do well to think how, for instance, they might embrace the Dickinson approach by formulating their own innovative yet practical approach to health care, rather than simply saying no all the time.

Sometimes, “a reluctance to be bold” only loses a revered “tradition that is old.”