Cradle Will Rock
Encyclopedia
Cradle Will Rock is a 1999 drama film
Drama film
A drama film is a film genre that depends mostly on in-depth development of realistic characters dealing with emotional themes. Dramatic themes such as alcoholism, drug addiction, infidelity, moral dilemmas, racial prejudice, religious intolerance, poverty, class divisions, violence against women...

 which chronicles the process and events that surrounded the production of the original 1937 musical The Cradle Will Rock
The Cradle Will Rock
The Cradle Will Rock is a 1937 musical by Marc Blitzstein. Originally a part of the Federal Theatre Project, it was directed by Orson Welles, and produced by John Houseman. The show was recorded and released on seven 78-rpm discs in 1938, making it the first cast album recording.The musical is a...

by Marc Blitzstein
Marc Blitzstein
Marcus Samuel Blitzstein, better known as Marc Blitzstein , was an American composer. He won national attention in 1937 when his pro-union musical The Cradle Will Rock, directed by Orson Welles, was shut down by the Works Progress Administration...

. Tim Robbins
Tim Robbins
Timothy Francis "Tim" Robbins is an American actor, screenwriter, director, producer, activist and musician. He is the former longtime partner of actress Susan Sarandon...

, in his third film as director, adapts history to create this fictionalized account of the original production, bringing in other stories of the time to produce this commentary on the role of art and power in the 1930s, particularly amidst the struggles of the 1930s labor movement and the corresponding appeal of socialism
Socialism
Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...

 and communism
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...

 among many intellectuals and working class
Working class
Working class is a term used in the social sciences and in ordinary conversation to describe those employed in lower tier jobs , often extending to those in unemployment or otherwise possessing below-average incomes...

 people of that time.

In telling the story of The Cradle Will Rock
The Cradle Will Rock
The Cradle Will Rock is a 1937 musical by Marc Blitzstein. Originally a part of the Federal Theatre Project, it was directed by Orson Welles, and produced by John Houseman. The show was recorded and released on seven 78-rpm discs in 1938, making it the first cast album recording.The musical is a...

—a leftist labor musical
Musical theatre
Musical theatre is a form of theatre combining songs, spoken dialogue, acting, and dance. The emotional content of the piece – humor, pathos, love, anger – as well as the story itself, is communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an...

 that was sponsored by the Federal Theater Project (FTP) only to be banned after the WPA
Works Progress Administration
The Works Progress Administration was the largest and most ambitious New Deal agency, employing millions of unskilled workers to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads, and operated large arts, drama, media, and literacy projects...

 cut the project and diverted its funds elsewhere–Robbins is able to tie in issues such as labor unrest, repression by the House Committee on Un-American Activities, and the role and value of art in such a tumultuous time.

The film was released in conjunction with a book that Robbins put together to provide a deeper look into the film's time period. The book includes the film’s script, which is accompanied by essays and pictures describing the people, events, and themes that are the basis for the film.

The film is not based on Orson Welles's script The Cradle Will Rock, which was to be an autobiographical account of the play's production. It went into pre-production
Pre-production
Pre-production or In Production is the process of preparing all the elements involved in a film, play, or other performance.- In film :...

 in 1983 with Rupert Everett
Rupert Everett
Rupert James Hector Everett is an English actor. He first came to public attention in 1981, when he was cast in Julian Mitchell's play and subsequent film Another Country as an openly gay student at an English public school, set in the 1930s...

 on board to play Welles before the backers pulled out and the production collapsed.

Plot

The film begins with a long tracking shot focusing on a destitute young woman named Olive Stanton (Emily Watson
Emily Watson
Emily Watson is an English actress. She gave an acclaimed debut film performance in Lars von Trier's Breaking the Waves.- Early life :...

). She is sleeping illegally in a theater, being awakened and kicked out. The shot continues as she slowly walks down the street following the sound of the song Nickel Under My Foot. When she arrives at the source of the music, the camera pans up the side of the building and moves inside where we are introduced to the playwright Marc Blitzstein
Marc Blitzstein
Marcus Samuel Blitzstein, better known as Marc Blitzstein , was an American composer. He won national attention in 1937 when his pro-union musical The Cradle Will Rock, directed by Orson Welles, was shut down by the Works Progress Administration...

 (Hank Azaria
Hank Azaria
Henry Albert "Hank" Azaria is an American film, television and stage actor, director, voice actor, and comedian. He is noted for being one of the principal voice actors on the animated television series The Simpsons , on which he performs the voices of Moe Szyslak, Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, Chief...

), who is attempting to write the songs and put together the musical The Cradle Will Rock
The Cradle Will Rock
The Cradle Will Rock is a 1937 musical by Marc Blitzstein. Originally a part of the Federal Theatre Project, it was directed by Orson Welles, and produced by John Houseman. The show was recorded and released on seven 78-rpm discs in 1938, making it the first cast album recording.The musical is a...

. Acting as Blitzstein’s conscience/mentors are a vision of his deceased wife and, later, an imaginary Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the...

. Brecht was a radical playwright who stressed the importance of breaking down the wall between the audience and actors.

The film continues, providing a picture of life in the 1930s, a time when some people wait in endless unemployment lines attempting to get work while others enjoy their wealth, attending parties and purchasing expensive works of art. As the musical nears production, the WPA
Works Progress Administration
The Works Progress Administration was the largest and most ambitious New Deal agency, employing millions of unskilled workers to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads, and operated large arts, drama, media, and literacy projects...

 cuts the budget for the FTP
Federal Theatre Project
The Federal Theatre Project was a New Deal project to fund theatre and other live artistic performances in the United States during the Great Depression. It was one of five Federal One projects sponsored by the Works Progress Administration...

 and puts a halt to all new productions. This announcement comes following the House Committee on Un-American Activities’ investigation of many of those involved in the FTP, and of the musical itself, due to its leftist themes concerning labor and union organization. Despite being canceled, the director, Orson Welles
Orson Welles
George Orson Welles , best known as Orson Welles, was an American film director, actor, theatre director, screenwriter, and producer, who worked extensively in film, theatre, television and radio...

 (Angus Macfadyen
Angus Macfadyen
Angus Macfadyen is a Scottish actor.Angus Macfadyen was born in Glasgow and was brought up partly in Africa, France, the Philippines and Singapore. His father was a doctor in the World Health Organisation. He was once engaged to actress Catherine Zeta-Jones.Angus attended the University of...

), and producer, John Houseman
John Houseman
John Houseman was a Romanian-born British-American actor and film producer who became known for his highly publicized collaboration with director Orson Welles from their days in the Federal Theatre Project through to the production of Citizen Kane...

 (Cary Elwes
Cary Elwes
Ivan Simon Cary Elwes , known professionally as Cary Elwes, is an English actor. The son of Dominick Elwes and Tessa Georgina Kennedy, Elwes acted in off-Broadway plays during college and moved to the United States in the early 1980s. He is known for his role as Westley in the cult classic The...

), lead the cast to another theater that was secured at the last minute. The cast is forbidden to perform by their union, so Blitzstein takes the stage alone at an upright piano to perform the show himself. He is shortly joined by many of the other cast members, delivering their lines from the audience. Robbins juxtaposes this final triumphant moment of the theater with images of the destruction of a mural commissioned by Nelson Rockefeller
Nelson Rockefeller
Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller was the 41st Vice President of the United States , serving under President Gerald Ford, and the 49th Governor of New York , as well as serving the Roosevelt, Truman and Eisenhower administrations in a variety of positions...

 (John Cusack
John Cusack
John Paul Cusack is an American film actor and screenwriter. He has appeared in more than 50 films, including The Journey of Natty Gann, Say Anything..., Grosse Point Blank, The Thin Red Line, Stand by Me, Con Air, Being John Malkovich, High Fidelity, Serendipity, Runaway Jury, The Ice Harvest,...

) because the artist, Diego Rivera
Diego Rivera
Diego María de la Concepción Juan Nepomuceno Estanislao de la Rivera y Barrientos Acosta y Rodríguez was a prominent Mexican painter born in Guanajuato, Guanajuato, an active communist, and husband of Frida Kahlo . His large wall works in fresco helped establish the Mexican Mural Movement in...

 (Ruben Blades
Rubén Blades
Rubén Blades Bellido de Luna is a Panamanian salsa singer, songwriter, lawyer, actor, Latin jazz musician, and politician, performing musically most often in the Afro-Cuban and Latin jazz genres...

), refused to remove the image of Lenin's face from the piece. In tying together stories of labor issues and steel strikes, censorship in painting and theater, and the disparities of wealth and power, Robbins is able to paint a picture of the 1930s that goes beyond simply recounting past events and questions the boundaries between art, power and politics. Furthermore, Robbins attempts to link these issues to the present day through the final shot of the film. The camera follows a mock funeral procession for the FTP as it marches into Times Square
Times Square
Times Square is a major commercial intersection in the borough of Manhattan in New York City, at the junction of Broadway and Seventh Avenue and stretching from West 42nd to West 47th Streets...

, only to pan up from this scene to a shot of the high rises and neon billboards that stand there today.

Cast

  • Hank Azaria
    Hank Azaria
    Henry Albert "Hank" Azaria is an American film, television and stage actor, director, voice actor, and comedian. He is noted for being one of the principal voice actors on the animated television series The Simpsons , on which he performs the voices of Moe Szyslak, Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, Chief...

     as Marc Blitzstein
    Marc Blitzstein
    Marcus Samuel Blitzstein, better known as Marc Blitzstein , was an American composer. He won national attention in 1937 when his pro-union musical The Cradle Will Rock, directed by Orson Welles, was shut down by the Works Progress Administration...

  • Bob Balaban
    Bob Balaban
    Robert Elmer "Bob" Balaban is an American actor, author and director.-Personal life:Balaban was born in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Eleanor and Elmer Balaban, who owned several movie theatres and later was a pioneer in cable television...

     as Harry Hopkins
    Harry Hopkins
    Harry Lloyd Hopkins was one of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's closest advisers. He was one of the architects of the New Deal, especially the relief programs of the Works Progress Administration , which he directed and built into the largest employer in the country...

  • Jack Black
    Jack Black
    Jack Black , is an American actor and musician, notably of Tenacious D.Jack Black may also refer to:* Jack Black , late 19th - early 20th Century author and hobo* Jack Black , drummer for 1970s UK punk band The Boys...

     as Sid
  • Ruben Blades
    Rubén Blades
    Rubén Blades Bellido de Luna is a Panamanian salsa singer, songwriter, lawyer, actor, Latin jazz musician, and politician, performing musically most often in the Afro-Cuban and Latin jazz genres...

     as Diego Rivera
    Diego Rivera
    Diego María de la Concepción Juan Nepomuceno Estanislao de la Rivera y Barrientos Acosta y Rodríguez was a prominent Mexican painter born in Guanajuato, Guanajuato, an active communist, and husband of Frida Kahlo . His large wall works in fresco helped establish the Mexican Mural Movement in...

  • Corina Katt Ayala
    Corina (singer)
    Corina Katt Ayala, best known only as Corina, is a dance pop singer from Manhattan, New York. She released a self-titled album on Atco Records in 1991, and charted string of dance hits in the US between 1989 and 1997. The highest charting of these was the summer 1991 top ten hit "Temptation", which...

     as Frida Kahlo
    Frida Kahlo
    Frida Kahlo de Rivera was a Mexican painter, born in Coyoacán, and perhaps best known for her self-portraits....

  • Victoria Clark
    Victoria Clark
    Victoria Clark is an American musical theatre singer and actress. Clark has performed in many Broadway musicals and in other theatre, film and television work, and her soprano voice can be heard on numerous cast albums and several animated films...

     as Dulce Fox
  • Joan Cusack
    Joan Cusack
    Joan Mary Cusack is an American film, stage and television actress. Throughout her career, Cusack has appeared in many films as well as appearing in stage productions....

     as Hazel Huffman
  • John Cusack
    John Cusack
    John Paul Cusack is an American film actor and screenwriter. He has appeared in more than 50 films, including The Journey of Natty Gann, Say Anything..., Grosse Point Blank, The Thin Red Line, Stand by Me, Con Air, Being John Malkovich, High Fidelity, Serendipity, Runaway Jury, The Ice Harvest,...

     as Nelson Rockefeller
    Nelson Rockefeller
    Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller was the 41st Vice President of the United States , serving under President Gerald Ford, and the 49th Governor of New York , as well as serving the Roosevelt, Truman and Eisenhower administrations in a variety of positions...

  • Cary Elwes
    Cary Elwes
    Ivan Simon Cary Elwes , known professionally as Cary Elwes, is an English actor. The son of Dominick Elwes and Tessa Georgina Kennedy, Elwes acted in off-Broadway plays during college and moved to the United States in the early 1980s. He is known for his role as Westley in the cult classic The...

     as John Houseman
    John Houseman
    John Houseman was a Romanian-born British-American actor and film producer who became known for his highly publicized collaboration with director Orson Welles from their days in the Federal Theatre Project through to the production of Citizen Kane...

  • Kyle Gass
    Kyle Gass
    Kyle Richard Gass , also known as KG or Kage, is an American rock musician, singer-songwriter and actor. He is a member of the bands Tenacious D and Trainwreck. In Tenacious D , Gass plays lead guitar and sings backup vocals, and also plays the role of Black's comic foil in most of their comedy...

     as Larry
  • Paul Giamatti
    Paul Giamatti
    Paul Edward Valentine Giamatti is an American actor. Giamatti began his career as a supporting actor in several films produced during the 1990s including Private Parts, The Truman Show, Saving Private Ryan, The Negotiator, and Man on the Moon, before earning lead roles in several projects in the...

     as Carlo
  • Philip Baker Hall
    Philip Baker Hall
    -Early life:Hall was born in Toledo, Ohio, the son of a factory worker father who was from Montgomery, Alabama. He attended the University of Toledo. As a younger man, Hall served in the military, started a family, and became a high school English teacher. In 1961, he decided to become an actor...

     as Gray Mathers
  • Erin Hill
    Erin Hill
    Erin Hill is an American harpist, singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and actress. Her musical performances have ranged from pop, psychedelic, and science fiction to kids music, opera, and Celtic. Hill’s 2009 album with her Celtic group hit #1 on the Billboard World Music Chart...

     as Sandra Mescal
  • Barnard Hughes
    Barnard Hughes
    Bernard Aloysius Kiernan “Barnard” Hughes was an American actor of theater and film. Hughes became famous for a variety of roles; his most notable roles came after middle age, and he was often cast as a dithering authority figure or grandfatherly elder.-Personal life:Hughes was born in Bedford...

     as Frank Marvel
  • Cherry Jones
    Cherry Jones
    Cherry Jones is an American actress and recipient of the 2009 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress – Drama Series and the 2005 Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play.-Career:...

     as Hallie Flanagan
    Hallie Flanagan
    Hallie Flanagan was an American theatrical producer and director, playwright, and author, best known as director of the Federal Theatre Project, a part of the Works Progress Administration .-Background:...

  • Angus Macfadyen
    Angus Macfadyen
    Angus Macfadyen is a Scottish actor.Angus Macfadyen was born in Glasgow and was brought up partly in Africa, France, the Philippines and Singapore. His father was a doctor in the World Health Organisation. He was once engaged to actress Catherine Zeta-Jones.Angus attended the University of...

     as Orson Welles
    Orson Welles
    George Orson Welles , best known as Orson Welles, was an American film director, actor, theatre director, screenwriter, and producer, who worked extensively in film, theatre, television and radio...

  • Bill Murray
    Bill Murray
    William James "Bill" Murray is an American actor and comedian. He first gained national exposure on Saturday Night Live in which he earned an Emmy Award and later went on to star in a number of critically and commercially successful comedic films, including Caddyshack , Ghostbusters , and...

     as Tommy Crickshaw
  • Allan F. Nicholls
    Allan F. Nicholls
    Allan F. Nicholls born April 8, 1945 in Montreal, Quebec, is a Canadian actor, film director, film producer, screenwriter, composer and musician. He was nominated for both a BAFTA and WGA award for his writing on the 1978 film A Wedding. He is often credited as Allan Nicholls.Allan was lead...

     as George Zorn
  • Vanessa Redgrave
    Vanessa Redgrave
    Vanessa Redgrave, CBE is an English actress of stage, screen and television, as well as a political activist.She rose to prominence in 1961 playing Rosalind in As You Like It with the Royal Shakespeare Company and has since made more than 35 appearances on London's West End and Broadway, winning...

     as Countess Constance LaGrange
  • Gil Robbins
    Gil Robbins
    Gilbert Lee "Gil" Robbins was an American folk singer, folk musician and actor. Robbins was a former member of the folk band, The Highwaymen. The New York Times described Robbins as a "fixture on the folk-music scene." He was the father of actor and director, Tim Robbins.-Early life:Robbins was...

     as Congressman Joe Starnes
    Joe Starnes
    Joe Starnes was a U.S. Representative from Alabama.-Biography:Born in Guntersville, Alabama, Starnes attended the public schools....

  • Susan Sarandon
    Susan Sarandon
    Susan Sarandon is an American actress. She has worked in films and television since 1969, and won an Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in the 1995 film Dead Man Walking. She had also been nominated for the award for four films before that and has received other recognition for her...

     as Margherita Sarfatti
    Margherita Sarfatti
    Margherita Sarfatti was a Jewish Italian journalist, art critic, patron, collector, socialite, and one of Benito Mussolini's mistresses.-Biography:...

  • Jamey Sheridan
    Jamey Sheridan
    James Patrick "Jamey" Sheridan is an American actor. He was born in Pasadena, California.He has had a prolific acting career in theater, television, and feature film productions. Born to a family of actors, he made it to Broadway and earned a Tony nomination in 1987 for his performance in the...

     as John Adair
  • Barbara Sukowa
    Barbara Sukowa
    Barbara Sukowa is a German theatre and film actress.- Work :Sukowa's stage debut was in Berlin in 1971, in a production of Peter Handke's Der Ritt über den Bodensee. Günter Beelitz invited her to join the ensemble of the Darmstädter National Theatre in the same year...

     as Sophie Silvano
  • John Turturro
    John Turturro
    John Michael Turturro is an American actor, writer and director known for his roles in the films Do the Right Thing , Miller's Crossing , Barton Fink , Quiz Show , The Big Lebowski , O Brother, Where Art Thou? and the Transformers film series...

     as Aldo Silvano
    Howard Da Silva
    Howard Da Silva was an American actor.-Early life:He was born Howard Silverblatt in Cleveland, Ohio, the son of Benjamin and Bertha Silverblatt. His parents were both Yiddish speaking Jews born in Russia. He had a job as a steelworker before beginning his acting career on the stage...

  • Emily Watson
    Emily Watson
    Emily Watson is an English actress. She gave an acclaimed debut film performance in Lars von Trier's Breaking the Waves.- Early life :...

     as Olive Stanton
  • Harris Yulin
    Harris Yulin
    Harris Yulin is an American actor who has appeared in dozens of Hollywood and television films.-Life and career:Yulin was born in...

     as Congressman Martin Dies
    Martin Dies, Jr.
    Martin Dies, Jr. was a Texas politician and a Democratic member of the United States House of Representatives. His father, Martin Dies, was also a member of the United States House of Representatives.-Biography:...


Historical context and critical reaction

This film takes place in the 1930s during the Great Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...

. The film takes some narrative license and presents certain events as simultaneous, when they really occurred at different times. Some examples of this are the addition and subsequent destruction of Rivera
Diego Rivera
Diego María de la Concepción Juan Nepomuceno Estanislao de la Rivera y Barrientos Acosta y Rodríguez was a prominent Mexican painter born in Guanajuato, Guanajuato, an active communist, and husband of Frida Kahlo . His large wall works in fresco helped establish the Mexican Mural Movement in...

's Man at the Crossroads
Man at the Crossroads
Man at the Crossroads was a mural by Diego Rivera.The Rockefellers wanted to have a mural put on the ground-floor wall of Rockefeller Center. Nelson Rockefeller wanted Henri Matisse or Pablo Picasso to do it because he favored their modern style, but neither was available...

in the RCA Building
GE Building
The GE Building is an Art Deco skyscraper that forms the centerpiece of Rockefeller Center in the midtown Manhattan section of New York City. Known as the RCA Building until 1988, it is most famous for housing the headquarters of the television network NBC...

 (1933–34), the Italian invasion of Ethiopia
Second Italo-Abyssinian War
The Second Italo–Abyssinian War was a colonial war that started in October 1935 and ended in May 1936. The war was fought between the armed forces of the Kingdom of Italy and the armed forces of the Ethiopian Empire...

 (1935), labor strikes against Little Steel
Memorial Day massacre of 1937
In the Memorial Day massacre of 1937, the Chicago Police Department shot and killed ten unarmed demonstrators in Chicago, on May 30, 1937. The incident took place during the "Little Steel Strike" in the United States....

 (1937) and the Dies Committee’s assault on the Federal Theatre Project
Federal Theatre Project
The Federal Theatre Project was a New Deal project to fund theatre and other live artistic performances in the United States during the Great Depression. It was one of five Federal One projects sponsored by the Works Progress Administration...

 (1938) (Weales 2000).

While the original production of The Cradle Will Rock
The Cradle Will Rock
The Cradle Will Rock is a 1937 musical by Marc Blitzstein. Originally a part of the Federal Theatre Project, it was directed by Orson Welles, and produced by John Houseman. The show was recorded and released on seven 78-rpm discs in 1938, making it the first cast album recording.The musical is a...

was stated to be “The most exciting evening of theater this New York generation has seen” (MacLeish, Cole 2000), some critics did not feel the same about Robbins’ reproduction of the event for film. Although it was nominated for the Palme d'Or
Palme d'Or
The Palme d'Or is the highest prize awarded at the Cannes Film Festival and is presented to the director of the best feature film of the official competition. It was introduced in 1955 by the organising committee. From 1939 to 1954, the highest prize was the Grand Prix du Festival International du...

 at the 1999 Cannes Film Festival
1999 Cannes Film Festival
The 52nd Cannes Film Festival was held on May 12-23, 1999. The Palme d'Or went to the French-Belgian film Rosetta by Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne.-Jury:* David Cronenberg * André Téchiné * Barbara Hendricks...

, among other festivals, and some have praised the film as an astute commentary on censorship and the lines between art and life (Cole 2000), others have criticized the piece for attempting to bring too many themes together into one story, and thus losing the power of the original context altogether (Alleva 2000; Weales 2000).

The children's play Revolt of the Beavers
Revolt of the Beavers
Revolt of the Beavers was a children's play put on by the Federal Theater Project by Oscar Saul and Louis Lantz. One critic described the play as "Marxism a la Mother Goose". The show ran at the Adelphi Theater in New York City from May 20, 1937 to June 19 of that year...

was also featured in this film. It too was under scrutiny from the HUAC for promoting a communistic ideal of equal work and equal rewards. In the film it was valiantly defended by the head of the FTP, Hallie Flanagan
Hallie Flanagan
Hallie Flanagan was an American theatrical producer and director, playwright, and author, best known as director of the Federal Theatre Project, a part of the Works Progress Administration .-Background:...

 (Cherry Jones
Cherry Jones
Cherry Jones is an American actress and recipient of the 2009 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress – Drama Series and the 2005 Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play.-Career:...

), and the play ran for approximately one month at the Adelphi theater in New York.
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