1776

With Independence Day nearing, I've watched the movie 1776 a couple of times in recent days.

The everlasting problem with musical comedy as a form is the moment of transition, when people stop conversing with each other and start singing to and about each other, or break into dance.

Some musicals, like Once or back-in-the-day, Showboat, or about musicals and performances, so the transition is easy to handle. The great song "Bill" in Showboat is sung by a performer offering an audition. Onc a showbiz milieu is established, even transitions that might be trickier seem natural too.

But 1776 doesn't have that crutch. It is about statesmen deliberating on politics, not musicians and stage performers. So an audience not determined to suspend disbelief might be tempted to ask they act so ... stagy?

For the most part, the transitions are handled with great skill. John and Abigauil Adams sing their love duets within what are fantasy sequences taking place, given the logic of the story, only in John's head. That works splendidly. In another scene, Martha Jefferson, who is in Philadelphia in the flesh, explains her husband's romantic appeal to a crusty Puritan and a randy old man alike. "He Plays the Violin," is her tune. You can see a YouTube of a stage performance of the moment here.

But some of the other transitions in this play/movie, alas, don't quite work. In "But Mister Adams," where the members of the committee that i supposed to be drafting a Declaration eachs begs off, the staginess of it just ends up being borderline silly. The ending of the clip, around 6:13, walks boldly past that border.

Here is the relevant clip from the movie. Jefferson has been singled out by process of elimination at about 3:42 in that clip and the really still stuff begins there, with Franklin, Sherman, and Livingstone doing the La-La-La chorus line thing for the Adams/Jefferson exchange.