What A Face in the Crowd and Meet John Doe tell us about populism, pop culture, and fear.
In the year of Trump, the 1957 film A Face in the Crowd has had more cameos in the political columns than any other revival-house staple. Pundit after pundit has pointed to the picture to explain the rise of the Republican nominee. That may say more about a certain segment of Donald Trump’s foes than it does about Trump or his following.
The movie traces its roots to a tipsy conversation screenwriter Budd Schulberg once had with Will Rogers Jr., the son of the folksy cowboy humorist. “My father was so full of shit,” Rogers declared, “because he pretends he’s just one of the people, just one of the guys...but in our house the only people that ever came as guests were the richest people in town, the bankers and the power brokers of L.A.” That comment inspired Schulberg’s short story “Your Arkansas Traveler,” and that story became the seed of A Face in the Crowd, scripted by Schulberg and directed by Elia Kazan. The picture has long been popular with people who fear the place where populism meets pop culture.
Esta historia es de la edición December 2016 de Reason magazine.
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Esta historia es de la edición December 2016 de Reason magazine.
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MATERIEL LOSS
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A Free-Range Family
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Educulture Wars
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Q&A Penny Lane
PENNY LANE'S NEW Netflix documentary, Confessions of a Good Samaritan, delves into her life-changing decision to donate a kidney to a stranger. Known for her thoughtful and provocative storytelling, Lane has explored human connection and empathy in films such as Hail Satan? and The Pain of Others. Last October she spoke with Reason's Nick Gillespie and shared her emotional, physical, and philosophical experience with anonymous kidney donation and the challenges that came with it.
