Cradle Will Rock Page #13

I will cut off your allowance.

You'll do nothing of the kind.

And if you do, then I'll

have to live as a gypsy does.

Constance!

Orson, jack, we've got the piano!

Come, come!

You know times are hard

when I look at you and see firewood.

- Hey, what are you saying?

- Why, my oaken friend,

- Mr. Roosevelt has laid us off.

- Cutbacks?

- Politics.

- I told you you shouldn't have ratted on my friends.

- Friends?

- Uh-oh.

Did you say friends?

Those Reds are your friends?

- Sorry, comrade.

- Comrade?

We are all comrades, and we will not

rest until all of the country is Red.

I've known this dummy

like the back of my hand, I swear.

In my own hand,

a revolutionary?

Ladies and gentlemen, this man

exploits my labor for his own profits.

This capitalist pays me zero,

works me whenever he likes.

I sleep in

a coffin-like apartment!

- You're a dummy!

- Dummies!

- This is what he calls us, brothers and sisters.

- Not you folks.

If it is dummies we are,

then I say, "Dummies, rise up!

Rise up to the proletarian call

of dummies everywhere!

Storm the barricades!

Riot in the streets!"

- Give him the hook!

-Arise, ye prisoners

Of starvation

Arise, ye wretched

of the Earth

- Forjustice thunders condemnation

- Get off the stage!

A better world in birth

Then, comrades, come rally

And the last fight

let us face

The Internationale

Unites the human race

And Aristophanes

was definitely a Communist.

So are we through?

Is this it?

- Should I be looking for a job?

- We've got another year, if we fight.

You know, I can understand the puritans,

I can understand the politics,

but I guess I don't understand

the passion of it.

- The intense anger.

- It's not just anger, it's fear.

- Fear?

- Mr. O'Hara, have you ever heard of Michael Grunwald?

- What, was he a Communist?

- No. Mr. De Rohan?

Michael Grunwald, an historian, Elizabethan

England. Not a Communist as far as I can tell.

Mr. O'Hara, have you read

any of his books?

- Uh, no, Congressman Flanagan.

I skipped that course.

But you know your history

of Elizabethan England.

- Yes. From Shakespeare, Madam Chairman.

- A playwright. I see.

- Mr. O'Hara, who was Richard III?

- A humpback and a killer.

Mr. De Rohan, what is Michael

Grunwald's opinion of Richard III?

Michael Grunwald would say that Richard

llI was a great ruler and much maligned.

And yet this Shakespeare has written

a play which is still performed,

while Mr. Grunwald's books

gather dust.

Would you consider that unfair,

Mr. De Rohan?

Why, yes. I would say that this

Mr. Shakespeare should be investigated.

And if all else fails,

we can remove his words.

Burn them.

We're not painting

pretty pictures with our plays.

It must scare

the hell out of them.

Well, the plays are written.

They're here forever.

Oh, I hope they are.

Federal Theater

is going to end.

But theater is

going to be better off.

We've launched a ship,

a grand and glorious ship.

How come

they did that, Dad?

You should ask your uncle.

That's his flag.

Olive!

- Hi.

- I thought you went home.

Um, I don't have a home now.

He kicked you out?

Can I sleep

on your floor tonight?

Sure.

I didn't want to miss this.

What in God's name were

you expecting from a Communist?

I wouldn't have had this

problem with Picasso or Matisse.

We control the future of art

because we pay for the future of art.

Appoint people to your museum boards

that detest the Rivera's of this world.

Celebrate the Matisses.

Create the next wave of art.

You have the purse strings.

It's quite obvious you have the power.

- Cultural power.

- Yes.

- To pay for the Matisse.

- Celebrate colors.

- Celebrate form.

- Portraits.

- Countrysides.

- Men on horses.

- Sunsets. Nudes.

- Oh, yes.

Ladies and gentlemen!

Welcome to the first runaway

production of the Federal Theater.

I'm sure that you are aware

by now of the circumstances...

that have led us to this dusty theater

on this beautiful summer night.

Something in this play

frightens people in Washington.

There must be some sinister

force at work in this play.

So without further ado,

allow me to introduce to you the

monster behind The Cradle Will Rock,

Mr. Marc Blitzstein.

Good evening.

Fade to black and we're

in Steeltown, U. S. A.

A prostitute walks down the street

and stops under a streetlamp.

This is Moll.

- Play.

- She sings:

I'm checkin' home now

Call it a night

Goin' up to my room

Turn on the light

Jesus

Turn off that light

I ain't in Steeltown long

I work two days a week

The other five

my efforts ain't required

For two days out of seven

Two dollar bills

I'm given

So I'm just searchin'

Along the street

For on those five days

It's nice to eat

jesus

Who said let's eat

Enter a well-dressed gentleman...

- Enter a well-dressed gentleman

who's on the make.

Uh, okay.

Enter me.

I'd like to give you

a hundred bucks

But I only got 30 cents

Nelson will fund the new wave of art.

A traveling exhibit throughout Europe,

highlighting American artists.

- Nonpolitical.

- Yes, abstract. Colors and form, not politics.

My papers will hail it

as the next new thing.

We'll canonize the artists,

make them rich.

And soon enough, all artists will be

doing the next new thing.

You think? There's

something about artists...

- that always gets socially concerned.

- That's true.

- They won't get paid for it.

- They won't be seen. They'll have no influence.

Rather than starve, they'll adapt.

It's survival.

And artists are whores,

like the rest of us.

Maybe you wonder what it is

Makes people good or bad

Why some guy

An ace without a doubt

Turns out to be a bastard

And the other way about

I'll tell you what I feel

It's just the nickel

under the heel

Go stand on someone's neck

While you're takin'

Cut into somebody's throat

as you put

For every dream

and scheme's

Depending on whether

All through the storm

You've kept it warm

That nickel under your foot

Scene two. We're now

in a holding cell.

Moll sits there,

depressed,

as Larry Foreman, a union leader,

is thrown in there with her.

He says...

Ohhhhh!

Ohhhhh!

Daddy!

Boy!

- I just been grilled!

- Ooh, you been hit good.

You're new here. What's the matter?

They catch you on the streets?

Uh-huh.

What'd they get you for?

Who me? Makin'a speech

and passin'out leaflets.

The formal charge is incitin' a riot.

Ain't you ever seen my act?

Well, I'm creepin'

along in the dark.

My eyes is crafty.

My pockets is bulgin'.

I'm loaded!

Armed to the teeth...

with leaflets!

I come up to you

very slow, very sneaky.

And with one fell gesture,

I tuck a leaflet in your hand.

One.

Two. Three.

Oh! There's a riot!

You're the riot! I incited you!

I'm terrific, I am.

Scene three.

A night court.

Enter the Liberty Committee.

Say! What's the whole Liberty

Committee doin'in a night court?

And on the other side

of the bars?

Think of what my people would

think if they could see me.

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