The Cradle Will Rock
To avoid government and union restrictions, the show was performed on June 16, 1937, with Blitzstein playing piano onstage and the cast members singing their parts from the audience.[1] The original cast consisted of John Adair, Guido Alexander, Marc Blitzstein, Peggy Coudray, Howard da Silva, George Fairchild, Robert Farnsworth, Edward Fuller, Will Geer, Maynard Holmes, Frank Marvel, Charles Niemeyer, Le Roi Operti, Jules Schmidt, George Smithfield, Olive Stanton, and Bert Weston.Blitzstein borrowed from a number of his other earlier works as well, which blunts the common notion that Kurt Weill and Hanns Eisler were undue influences.[7]: 246 In the fall of 1936, Blitzstein attended a performance of the Federal Theatre Project 891 farce Horse Eats Hat and went backstage to meet the show's writer-director, 21-year-old Orson Welles.In the midst of our doldrums and as part of the complicated game of one-upmanship that Orson and I were constantly playing together, I suggested one night in his dressing room that if I were ever invited to hear Marc's work, I might conceivably find it suitable for production at the Maxine Elliott for Project 891.Hallie Flanagan, national director of the Federal Theatre Project, was invited to a dinner party March 1, 1937,[5]: 223 at the apartment Houseman shared with composer Virgil Thomson.Blitzstein auditioned his opera for Flanagan—this time supported by the strident voice of Howard da Silva, an actor Welles knew from his radio work who had also led the Federal Theatre Project in his native Cleveland.This was in its percussive as well as its verbal beat Steeltown, U.S.A.: street corner, mission, lawn of Mr. Mister, drugstore, hotel lobby, faculty room, night court: America, 1937.Editor Daily, the head of the local newspaper, begins running articles attacking the steelworkers union and its leader, Larry Foreman, while also hiring the inept Junior Mister as a foreign correspondent.Gus Polack, a newly elected member of the union, is murdered in a car bombing that also kills his wife and unborn child, as well as Harry's son Stevie.[10]: 138 Members of the large company would have two months or more of rehearsal time and employment as the show was prepared—a luxury that the Federal Theatre Project, as a New Deal work-relief program, was designed to afford.[10]: 138 Having arranged for Howard da Silva to play labor organizer Larry Foreman, Welles cast Will Geer as capitalist boss Mr. Mister.For the role of Moll, the young woman who prostitutes herself to avoid starving, he found Olive Stanton, an actress who had appeared in the Federal Theatre Project production Class of '29 (1936).[8]: 386 [18] An ingenue in early Universal Pictures films, Peggy Coudray (Mrs. Mister) had earned praise for her comedy skills in soubrette roles in stage musicals and operettas.[21] "It is not very fashionable these days to refer admiringly to the Federal Theatre Project, and yet it was responsible for a great number of today's writers, stars, directors and stage designers," Blitzstein said in a 1956 interview.[5]: 226 Welles talked Blitzstein into a flashy stage design "full of metal and glass and the horror of Steeltown":[3]: 132 I told Marc he shouldn't do an opera for the ladies' garment workers and the communist union.[22]: 159 Houseman described "an extravagant scenic scheme that called for a triple row of three-dimensional velour portals between which narrow glass-bottomed fluorescent platforms, loaded with scenery and props, slid smoothly past each other as the scene shifted back and forth".[9]: 293 Accustomed to an open stage and the accompaniment of only Blitzstein's piano, the well-rehearsed cast was disconcerted when they began to work with the sliding scenery and a large orchestra."On June 10," Flanagan wrote, "after weeks of debate in Washington we received the definite order to cut the New York project by 30 percent, involving the dismissal of 1,701 workers."[11]: 202 Flanagan received another memorandum June 12, stating that "no openings of new productions shall take place until after the beginning of the coming fiscal year" due to an expected cut in federal appropriations.The hastily invited audience of several hundred people included producer Arthur Hopkins, playwrights Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman, and writer and editor V. J.[7]: 256 [24]: 41 Syndicated columnist Jay Franklin reported: "Those who saw the dress rehearsal say that it is a gay, fast-moving, exciting show—one which subjects the social scene to radical criticism and still retains a sense of humor and of proportion.[7]: 256 [25] "The hammer fell in the form of considerable governmental budget cuts just as Cradle was to open," Welles said, "at the height of the CIO's efforts to organize steel.The musicians' union refused to play for the show unless Houseman could provide their full salaries, and Actors' Equity Association stated that its members could not perform onstage at the new theatre without approval of the original producer (the federal government).[27] According to The New York Times's description of the original production, "Persons who heard the opera's score and extracts last night carried no clear impression except that its theme was that steel workers should join a union.""[1] Houseman determined that there were no legal restrictions on performing the musical with a new financial backer, and beginning on June 18, Helen Deutsch, press agent for the Theatre Guild, agreed to serve as the financial backer for The Cradle Will Rock; the actors received a two-week leave of absence from the WPA, and, in an agreement with Actors' Equity, Deutsch paid the 19 cast members $1500 for the two weeks' performances.[35] The show was revived Off-Broadway in 1964 in a production starring Jerry Orbach (Larry Foreman), Nancy Andrews (Mrs. Mister), Lauri Peters (Moll), and Micki Grant (Ella Hammer), directed by Howard da Silva.Mehmet Ergen directed a production in London for the Arcola Theatre's 10th Anniversary in 2010 starring Alicia Davies, Stuart Matthew Price, Morgan Deare, Chris Jenkins and Josie Benson.
Cradle Will RockAnd the Cradle Will Rock...Marc BlitzsteinBroadwayrevivalOff-BroadwayWest Endplay in musicFederal Theatre ProjectOrson WellesJohn HousemanBrechtianunionizesung-throughoperaticHoward da SilvaWill GeerMercury TheatreDaily WorkerThe New SchoolBertolt BrechtKurt WeillHanns EislerWilliam Morris AgencyHerman ShumlinHarold ClurmanGroup TheatreMartin GabelHorse Eats HatTheatre GuildMaxine ElliottHallie FlanaganVirgil ThomsonU.S. Steelsteelworkers unionSupreme CourtaffirmedWagner Actfive-month strike1937 Memorial Day massacreRepublic SteelWorld War IbaritonesopranoMaxine Elliott's TheatreLehman EngelNew York Journal-AmericanUniversal PicturessoubretteEdward ArnoldHiram ShermanMichel FokineAsadata DaforaVoodoo MacbethVanity FairHarper'stravelersrevolveMacbethArthur HopkinsMoss HartGeorge S. KaufmanV. J. JeromeJay FranklinVenice TheatreActors' Equity AssociationArchibald MacLeishHelen DeutschCaesarWindsor TheatreMansfield TheatreBroadway TheatreAlfred DrakeVivian VanceJack AlbertsonUnity TheatreNew York City OperaNew York City CenterTammy GrimesDavid AtkinsonJerry OrbachNancy AndrewsLauri PetersMicki GrantLeonard BernsteinGershon KingsleyObie AwardThe Acting CompanyPatti LuPoneThe Old VicOlivier AwardArcola TheatreStuart Matthew PriceChris JenkinsNeo-FuturistsRupert EverettJonathan RosenbaumTim RobbinsDiego RiveraMan at the CrossroadsRockefeller CenterOlive StantonJohn TurturroBarnard HughesVictoria ClarkGregg EdelmanAudra McDonaldDaniel JenkinsErin HillChris McKinneyThe New York TimesPollack, HowardOxford University PressLehrman, Leonard J.Houseman, JohnSimon & SchusterMcGilligan, PatrickHarperCallow, SimonFlanagan, HalliePlaybillBlitzstein, MarcRandom HouseOja, Carol J.Wood, BretWelles, Orson