Time - Man of the Year/Time_Man_of_the_Year_Compact_Publishing_3YX-Disc-1_Compact_Publishing_1993.iso/moy/122892/12289948.000

Text File | 1993-04-08 | 4KB | 79 lines

                                                                                REVIEWS, Page 67

TELEVISION

Trying to Hype History


By RICHARD ZOGLIN

    SHOW: LINCOLN
    TIME: Dec. 26 and 27, ABC
    THE BOTTOM LINE: A network attempt to duplicate The Civil
War is filled with stars but short of eloquence.


    The Civil War was not just the pivotal event of American
history. It provided a milestone in TV history as well. The
astonishing popularity of Ken Burns' 12-hour mini-series, which
aired on PBS in September 1990, profoundly shook the TV world.
On PBS, attempts to duplicate The Civil War's success have
ranged from big-event mini-series like Columbus and the Age of
Disto countless American Experience documentaries. The
commercial networks too have jealously eyed the program's hefty
ratings. It was only a matter of time before one of them took
a chance on a similar effort. Which is the reason for Lincoln.

    Airing in two parts on ABC, this four-hour documentary
follows the Civil War model by combining archival photographs
with excerpts from contemporaneous diaries and letters. The
producers -- Philip Kunhardt Jr., a former managing editor of
LIFE magazine, and his two sons Peter and Philip III -- have
drawn on famous Mathew Brady portraits, as well as an
extraordinary collection of Lincoln photos assembled by the
elder Kunhardt's grandfather, Frederick Hill Meserve. There is
music by Alan Menken (Aladdin), narration by James Earl Jones
and readings by a stellar cast of Hollywood celebrities as the
voices of the principals. All of them paying tribute to the most
sainted figure in American history. How could it miss?

    It misses. Lincoln, despite good intentions and a great
subject, is a textbook case of wrongheaded network decision
making. One problem is the all-star voice-overs. Richard
Dreyfuss, Oprah Winfrey, Glenn Close, Richard Widmark, Rod
Steiger and Arnold Schwarzenegger (as Lincoln's Bavarian-born
secretary, John G. Nicolay), among many others, seem to have
been recruited mainly for marquee value. Their too famous voices
distract from the subject matter; nor do they bring any
particular eloquence to their tasks, least of all Jason Robards,
who overdoes the corn-pone twang as the most uncharismatic
Lincoln imaginable.

    Because it is framed around the Civil War (Lincoln's early
life is covered only briefly in flashbacks), the series seems
unduly repetitive of Burns' work. The writing is uninspired (on
the Battle of Gettysburg: "It was the showdown of the war.
Whoever won here might well claim victory overall"). And there
is a woeful shortage of analysis. Significantly, one element of
The Civil War that the Kunhardts did not copy was the use of
historians to provide onscreen commentary. They are missed. We
get plenty of piquant details about Lincoln's personal life --
his fits of depression, his estrangement from his father, his
big feet -- but virtually no attempt to relate these to his
public life, or to explain the qualities that made him a great
President.

    Even basic political matters are left hazy. Before the
election of 1864, Lincoln predicted, "I am going to be beaten,
and beaten badly." Another fit of depression, or was he in real
political trouble? He wound up, of course, winning decisively.
Why? No clues here. The documentary spends far more time on
melodrama, especially the events leading up to Lincoln's
assassination. It's an effort to hype a story that, as The Civil
War should have proved, doesn't need it.