Artist Statement
The aftermath of the Civil War, referred to by historians as the Reconstruction era, is an often misunderstood part of American history. Our screenplay is a psychological narrative where two flawed individuals, a fictional protagonist named William Cromwell and the infamous John Wilkes Booth, reflect some of the darker ideals of both the North and South respectively as Reconstruction occurred. William Cromwell reflects extreme self-interest of the industrialized North while John Wilkes Booth reflects Southern romantic idealism. Due to shrewdness, Cromwell wins in the end and profits for himself while Booth meets his demise much like the Southern ideals he espouses. Much like Citizen Kane, we wanted the plot to center on complicated characters with whom we could sympathize with, but also criticize. Our story is not only critical of some of the North’s treatment of the South at the end of the Civil War, but it also (like Citizen Kane) stands as a caution to current society of the damaging effects of extreme self-interest on American society. Additionally, we wanted our story to be a bit unrealistic in its presentation by incorporating a bit of humor and improbability much like what was portrayed in our class reading of The Veil, which slightly exaggerates reality and suggests a personal viewpoint of events through its animation style. We too did not try to fully present reality, but rather exaggerate the ideals of the two main characters in order to further establish our theme and caution. We wanted it to be obvious that our story was based heavily on personal opinions and attitudes, yet informed by objective historical events.
The attitudes and beliefs of our protagonist were based off an often forgotten group from the Civil War era--carpetbaggers. We forget that there was more going on than simply North vs South. According to our research, “...most carpetbaggers probably combine the desire for personal gain with a commitment to taking part in an effort “to substitute the civilization of freedom for that of slavery.”” (Eric Foner, Reconstruction: America’s Unfinished Revolution 1863-1877, (1988) p. 296) William Cromwell was based off of this group. Although he did not agree with the John Booth, he worked with the pro-southern man in order to make money. After he acquired such money, he quickly sold out John Booth to the Union soldiers, fighting for freedom in a dark and betraying way. Based on this context, the story stands as a criticism of the North’s treatment of the South post-Civil War, where many “carpetbaggers” took advantage of the South in order to gain personal profit. Cromwell became a microcosm for some Northern attitudes after the war, which were based on self-interest and moral justification.
The second part of our historical research went deeper into the events surrounding the Lincoln assassination and the motives (as history suggests) of John Wilkes Booth. We knew the Lincoln was killed at Ford’s Theater by a gunshot wound, but were surprised to find that Booth’s plan included conspiring with multiple individuals in order to cripple the U.S government beyond President Lincoln. A noted Civil War reporter, George Alfred Townsend, stated in regards to the co-conspirators, “Booth informed Powell, Herold, and Atzerodt of his intention to kill Lincoln. He assigned Powell to assassinate Secretary of State William H. Seward and Atzerodt to assassinate Vice President Andrew Johnson. Herold would assist in their escape into Virginia.” We also learned that another target was going to be Ulysses S. Grant, but he decided not to show up to the theater at the last moment. Given these facts, we were inspired to place our protagonist in the assassination scheme and have his target be Grant, as this would set up the opportunity for the protagonist to separate from and betray Booth in the aftermath of the assassination. Since our protagonist was fictional, it presented a nice “what if” scenario we could play with in order to further establish the theme of self-interest over ideals.
On this topic, we also looked into reports regarding Booth’s personal motives for assassinating Lincoln. In his 2005 analysis of Lincoln's assassination, Thomas Goodrich wrote, "All the elements in Booth's nature came together at once – his hatred of tyranny, his love of liberty, his passion for the stage, his sense of drama, and his lifelong quest to become immortal." We thought that Booth should be a complicated character much like the protagonist. By making him a character with somewhat plausible reasoning behind his actions, and being betrayed by his ally, Cromwell, we wanted to portray Booth simply as a man with a strong credo. He believed in freedom and standing up for personal truth, which are both inherently American ideals. In the end, Booth and our protagonist both wanted to assert their individuality and achieve some personal end by their actions, but went about it in very different ways. The characters remind us to be careful with our own ambitions, as we too can be caught up with outside circumstances as we make our own history.
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