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| Beyond Hamilton: five shows Pence and Trump should see together Beyond Hamilton: five shows Pence and Trump should see together | |
| (14 days later) | |
| Everyone knows what happened when the US vice-president elect, Mike Pence, attended a performance of the hip-hop musical Hamilton recently. He was booed by sections of the audience and was the target of a curtain speech stressing the importance of diversity. This led an angry Donald Trump to tweet that “the theater must always a be a safe and special place”. Special, possibly. Safe, no. So I would suggest a list of five works from the American theatrical canon that might be revived to provide instruction, or even enlightenment, for Messrs Trump and Pence before they take office. | Everyone knows what happened when the US vice-president elect, Mike Pence, attended a performance of the hip-hop musical Hamilton recently. He was booed by sections of the audience and was the target of a curtain speech stressing the importance of diversity. This led an angry Donald Trump to tweet that “the theater must always a be a safe and special place”. Special, possibly. Safe, no. So I would suggest a list of five works from the American theatrical canon that might be revived to provide instruction, or even enlightenment, for Messrs Trump and Pence before they take office. |
| 1. Of Thee I Sing (1931) | 1. Of Thee I Sing (1931) |
| This show, by George and Ira Gershwin and George S Kaufman, became the first musical to win the Pulitzer prize and hilariously lampoons American politics. The chosen presidential candidate, John P Wintergreen, has no coherent policies and reluctantly agrees to marry the winner of a beauty pageant. Since she turns out to be a descendant of Napoleon, his ditching of her prompts the prospect of war with France and threats of his impeachment. The funniest character, however, is the vice-president, Alexander Throttlebottom, whose name and face no one can ever remember but who succeeds to the top job. Given that one New York columnist, David Brooks, has already suggested Trump will either resign or be impeached within a year, this could be a must-see for the hapless Pence. | This show, by George and Ira Gershwin and George S Kaufman, became the first musical to win the Pulitzer prize and hilariously lampoons American politics. The chosen presidential candidate, John P Wintergreen, has no coherent policies and reluctantly agrees to marry the winner of a beauty pageant. Since she turns out to be a descendant of Napoleon, his ditching of her prompts the prospect of war with France and threats of his impeachment. The funniest character, however, is the vice-president, Alexander Throttlebottom, whose name and face no one can ever remember but who succeeds to the top job. Given that one New York columnist, David Brooks, has already suggested Trump will either resign or be impeached within a year, this could be a must-see for the hapless Pence. |
| 2. A Raisin in the Sun (1959) | 2. A Raisin in the Sun (1959) |
| Trump’s election campaign has been described as “a festival of racism and misogyny”. It might be doubly fitting, therefore, to expose him to this work by Lorraine Hansberry, which made her the first black woman ever to have a play on Broadway and has become a modern classic: it even spawned a spin-off in Bruce Norris’s Clybourne Park (2010), which proved that issues of race and property remain permanently intertwined. The play shows a divided black family living on Chicago’s South Side being bribed to stay out of a close-knit white neighbourhood. Although Hansberry offers a totally unsentimental portrait of the family’s deluded patriarch, she also vividly demonstrates defiance overcoming oppression and family pride triumphing over bullying white prejudice. | Trump’s election campaign has been described as “a festival of racism and misogyny”. It might be doubly fitting, therefore, to expose him to this work by Lorraine Hansberry, which made her the first black woman ever to have a play on Broadway and has become a modern classic: it even spawned a spin-off in Bruce Norris’s Clybourne Park (2010), which proved that issues of race and property remain permanently intertwined. The play shows a divided black family living on Chicago’s South Side being bribed to stay out of a close-knit white neighbourhood. Although Hansberry offers a totally unsentimental portrait of the family’s deluded patriarch, she also vividly demonstrates defiance overcoming oppression and family pride triumphing over bullying white prejudice. |
| 3. The Best Man (1960) | 3. The Best Man (1960) |
| For proof of the timeless dirtiness of American machine politics, there could be no better example than Gore Vidal’s poisonous satire: although its leading figures are clearly based on Adlai Stevenson, Joe McCarthy and Harry Truman, the play’s pertinence was proved by popular Broadway revivals in 2001 and 2012. At its heart is the creepy figure of Senator Joseph Cantwell, a bigot and a charlatan who releases a damaging psychiatric analysis of his presidential opponent in order to ruin his campaign. At one point Cantwell is told by an ex-president, “It’s not that I mind your being a bastard: it’s your being such a stupid bastard I object to.” Initially attacked as melodrama, Vidal’s play now seems more relevant than ever. | For proof of the timeless dirtiness of American machine politics, there could be no better example than Gore Vidal’s poisonous satire: although its leading figures are clearly based on Adlai Stevenson, Joe McCarthy and Harry Truman, the play’s pertinence was proved by popular Broadway revivals in 2001 and 2012. At its heart is the creepy figure of Senator Joseph Cantwell, a bigot and a charlatan who releases a damaging psychiatric analysis of his presidential opponent in order to ruin his campaign. At one point Cantwell is told by an ex-president, “It’s not that I mind your being a bastard: it’s your being such a stupid bastard I object to.” Initially attacked as melodrama, Vidal’s play now seems more relevant than ever. |
| 4. Angels in America (1991-92) | 4. Angels in America (1991-92) |
| The shadow of McCarthy also hangs over Tony Kushner’s astonishing two-part fantasia in that one of its principal figures is Roy Cohn, McCarthy’s red-baiting sidekick who, even when told he has contracted Aids, refuses to admit he is gay. But that is only one strand in a multi-dimensional play that deals with the emergence of the new right in America, the prevailing uncertainty facing the next millennium and the equivocal consolation of religious faith in the modern world. In its belief in tolerance, openness and a just and diverse society, it stands for everything Trump questions and might be a provocative dish to set before the president-elect. | The shadow of McCarthy also hangs over Tony Kushner’s astonishing two-part fantasia in that one of its principal figures is Roy Cohn, McCarthy’s red-baiting sidekick who, even when told he has contracted Aids, refuses to admit he is gay. But that is only one strand in a multi-dimensional play that deals with the emergence of the new right in America, the prevailing uncertainty facing the next millennium and the equivocal consolation of religious faith in the modern world. In its belief in tolerance, openness and a just and diverse society, it stands for everything Trump questions and might be a provocative dish to set before the president-elect. |
| 5. The Scottsboro Boys (2010) | 5. The Scottsboro Boys (2010) |
| As a reminder of American society at its worst – and American theatre at its best – you couldn’t have a finer example than this musical by John Kander and Fred Ebb. It is based on the infamous case of nine black teenagers who were falsely accused of rape in the segregated Alabama of the 1930s. Its brilliance lies in resurrecting the datedly offensive form of a minstrel show to expose the racist bigotry that pervaded the case. It is a supreme example of the potency of theatrical irony in that the jauntiness of the songs is in stark contrast to the injustice at the story’s heart. Donald Trump fondly imagines theatre to be a “safe” place. This powerful work proves just how subversive it can be. | As a reminder of American society at its worst – and American theatre at its best – you couldn’t have a finer example than this musical by John Kander and Fred Ebb. It is based on the infamous case of nine black teenagers who were falsely accused of rape in the segregated Alabama of the 1930s. Its brilliance lies in resurrecting the datedly offensive form of a minstrel show to expose the racist bigotry that pervaded the case. It is a supreme example of the potency of theatrical irony in that the jauntiness of the songs is in stark contrast to the injustice at the story’s heart. Donald Trump fondly imagines theatre to be a “safe” place. This powerful work proves just how subversive it can be. |
| But those are just my choices of American plays and shows to set before Trump and Pence. What, I wonder, are yours? | But those are just my choices of American plays and shows to set before Trump and Pence. What, I wonder, are yours? |