HAMILTON AND JOHN ADAMS

After seeing the great musical Hamilton when it premiered on Disney+ earlier this month I found myself enjoying it immensely.  I thought it would be fun to do a short compare and contrast with another great work that I have enjoyed: John Adams.  This was a miniseries that HBO produced and aired in 2008, which like Hamilton was met with rave reviews from critics and was given numerous awards.   

The differences are immediate and visually obvious Hamilton is a stage play while John Adams is mini-series for television.  John Adams has seven episodes each slightly over an hour making the entire project over eight hours long, where Hamilton total run time is two and half hours.  It is true that Hamilton only lived about half as long as John Adams but that the play has less than a third of the time to tell his story.   The star of Hamilton, Lin-Manuel Miranda, also wrote the play, while John Adams starred Paul Giamatti and was written by Kirk Ellis.

David Morse as George Washington in John Adams. 

Then there are the aesthetics.  Hamilton is a musical and it bills itself as “the story of America then told by America of today.” The genre of music is a diverse selection of R &B, soul, hip-hop, and traditional-style show tunes.  The casting of Hamilton is revolutionary diverse with roles of white historical figures going to actors who are people of color.  This is done following the “America then told by America today” standard.  The nation is a much more diverse place then it was in the late 18^th and early 19^th centuries.  Not only has the diversity increased, but as a measure of the country’s progress, the positions people of color now have the opportunity to fill has changed as well.  The play was written and premiered during the presidency of Barrack Obama.   It was a powerful message of inclusion in a narrative where people of color were traditional excluded.   

Christopher Jackson as George Washington in Hamilton. 

John Adams on the other hand is a period piece which does its best to retain an authentic look from the period.  This can be seen from the wardrobe trying to replicate the type of fabrics of the period; to the props trying to insure authentic appearance to the carriages, fire arms, etc; finally to the make-up trying to make the actors look more like the historical figures they are trying to represent.  In short, their set tries to re-create the world as it existed in the late 18^th century.

Daveed Diggs as Thomas Jefferson in Hamilton. 

Now we come to the similarities.  Both works are based on a life of an American Founding Father.  Both works are closely based on popularly written biographies about those founders.  John Adams was based on David McCullough’s 2001 biography of the same name, while Hamilton was based on Ron Chernow’s 2004 biography titled Alexander Hamilton. 

Stephen Dillane as Thomas Jefferson in John Adams. 

The most important similarity between the two works (and if you take anything away from this review let be this) is while the settings of these works are the American Revolution and the establishment of the U.S. Constitution these events are not what either is about.   Both are about its principal subject be it Alexander Hamilton or John Adams.  Every event we witness and every other historical figure we meet is based on what the subject perceived.  However when one glances back with that in mind it again brings us to important distinctions in each work. 

In John Adams the American Revolution is a gruesome and undesirable necessity carried out in order to defend the rights of the colonists as citizens, because that is what the Revolution was to Mr. Adams.  In Hamilton, the American Revolution is exciting and wonderful opportunity for talented people born without high privilege to “rise up” and above their station.  This is because that is what Revolution meant to Alexander Hamilton.   Hamilton presents George Washington as this courageous general who doubles as a father figure, because that is who he was to fatherless Alexander Hamilton.  While the John Adams George Washington is a noble, stoic, and often distant figure because that is how he appeared to Adams.     

Then there is Thomas Jefferson.  The Thomas Jefferson of Hamilton comes off as the villain of the piece.  Easily one of the most enjoyable characters of the play Jefferson is exciting to watch and he is foil to poor Mr. Hamilton in every instance of the play’s second act. Again, this is who Jefferson was to Alexander Hamilton, so they play presents him as such.  In John Adams, Jefferson is often quiet and self-conscious, Adams is one of those who help him find his voice.  He recruits him to write the Declaration of Independence.  Once Jefferson has his voice and once America becomes a nation complete with a new Constitution the two friends become rivals.  The relationship of Adams and Jefferson as one-time friends who turn on each other mirrors the relationship between Hamilton and Burr in the play, except for that disastrous ending. 

Speaking of Burr, he had no role in the HBO miniseries.  Not only was Aaron Burr absent but James Madison, the Father of the Constitution, is mentioned only in passing.  This has little to do with the historic importance rather their impact on the life of John Adams in comparison with other figures.  Likewise the play Hamilton does not include the John Hancock, Samuel Adams (mentioned only as the name of a drink) and most importantly does not have a character of Benjamin Franklin.  This is not an over-site of Lin-Manuel Miranda just a reflection of those historical figures impact on Alexander Hamilton.

What is most interesting is how Adams and Hamilton are presented in each other’s drama.  In Hamilton Adams never makes an appearance, but he comes up in discussion and song a number of times.  He first mentioned by Eliza as she tries to get her husband to come out to the country pointing out that Adams does this for his wife.  To which Hamilton responds that, as Vice President, Adams does not have a real job.  Later after Adams becomes President, Jefferson and Madison are discussing how he and Hamilton had a fall out leading to Adams dismissing Hamilton and Hamilton coming out and publicly attacking the leader of his own party.  This damages the Federalists so badly that it practically hands the election to the Democratic-Republicans.  After Jefferson and Madison are done talking it over the audience sees Hamilton from the raised flat of the stage and dropping a book down to the floor shouting John Adams name.

Rufus Sewell as Alexander Hamilton in John Adams

In John Adams, Hamilton as a character appears in two episodes.  His first appearance is in the fifth episode “Unite or Die.” In this episode Hamilton appears at an early meeting of George Washington’s cabinet.  During the meeting he basically schools Thomas Jefferson on economics and lays out plans to set up a National Bank and assume the states’ debts.  This of course laid the ground work for stability of the United States Government.  A success from the Washington Administration that when Jefferson became President in 1801 he found that messing with it would be detrimental to the Union.  Hamilton’s second appearance is in the sixth episode “Unnecessary War” in which shows the clash between Adams/Hamilton more sympathetically to Adams.  Their fallout shows a Hamilton who has bitten off more than he can chew and needs Adams to bring him back to reality.

In closing I highly enjoyed both works and would encourage anyone to watch them.  Just remember when doing so with each presentation you are learning about a great historical figure who existed in an extraordinary setting of the American Revolution.  The setting and the characters in it are seen only from the view of the main character.  This is not to say you might not learn a thing or two about these periods but just keep in mind how it is slanted.                  

THE CHAMPION OF INDEPENDENCE

A review of David McCullough’s John Adams (2001)

(Rating: 5 of 5)

It has been a few years since I first read John Adams.  I decided to re-read the book for the purpose of reviewing it.  McCullough’s work as an author is a testament that history does not have to be boring.  When one thinks of all the titans of this era, in some ways Mr. Adams comes up a little short.  Regulated to history as ‘number 2’ the one-term president who follows George Washington and who precedes Thomas Jefferson, John Adams is not typically thought of as the most interesting of the founders.  That was until 2001, when McCullough wrote this stunning book about a man whom without there may not have been a United States of America.

Young Abigail and John Adams

            McCullough traces John Adams time as a young lawyer who is a loyal subject of the British Empire.  After the abuses to what Adams believes are the rightful liberties of British subjects that the colonists are entitled, he would go to Congress and take up the cause of independence.  His performance at the Congress was second to none.  It was John Adams that nominated George Washington to command the continental army.  It was Adams, who with Jefferson and Franklin, would bring the Congress around to declaring the nation’s independence from the British crown.  McCullough also shows how it was not as neat in tidy as in the classic paintings.  In fact, the Founding Fathers themselves contributed to that misconception.
                

“In later years, Jefferson would entertain guests at Monticello with descriptions of black flies that so tormented the delegates, biting through their silk hose that they had hurried the signing along as swiftly as possible.  But at the time Jefferson wrote nothing of the occasion, not did John Adams.  In old age, trying to reconstruct events of that crowed summer, both men would stubbornly and incorrectly insist that the signing took place of July 4.” (p.138)

Franklin, Adams, and Jefferson

            After securing the nation’s independence Adams spends a great deal of time abroad in foreign courts trying to win over allies to the American cause.  In this he often becomes loggerheads with Ben Franklin.  Adams was one of the diplomats who help negotiate the Treaty of Paris (1783) where American independence was recognized by the British Empire.  He would be the first American to represent his country in the Court of St. James.  Adams found he rather liked King George III, all things considered, and McCullough points out the two men had a great deal in common.
 

“His Majesty the King of England and the new American minister to the Court of St. James’s were not without common interests and notable similarities.  Like John Adams, King George III was devoted to farming.  Seldom was His Majesty happier than when inspecting his farms, or talking crops and Merino sheep with his farm workers at Windsor.  Like Adams, the King had a passion for books.  The difference, as with the farming, was mainly a matter of scale.  His private library was one of the treasures of Britain.  During Adams’s earlier stay in London, the American painter Benjamin West had arranged a tour of the royal quarters at Buckingham House, and for Adams the high point had been seeing the King’s library.  He wished he could stay a week, Adams had said.” (p.333)

Mr. Adams meets the King

            A good deal of the book is dedicated to Adams relationship with his children, his daughter ‘Nabby’ (Young Abigail), his future president son John Quincy, and his other two useless sons, Charles and Thomas.  Most important however is the relationship with his life partner, Abigail.  America clearly has many Founding Fathers, if it were to have any Founding Mothers Abigail Adams would certainly be a strong candidate for the title.  In many ways she was her husband’s superior especially where money was concerned.  Jefferson pointed out the reason Adams was better off than he was financially, is because of Mrs. Adams running of their family finances.
  

“As she predicted, the bill for the Bank of the United States passed by a sizable majority, despite opposition from Madison and Jefferson, who urged the President to exercise a veto on constitutional grounds.  But Hamilton’s views carried greater weight with Washington, who signed the bill on February 25.

            Better versed on financial matters than her husband, Abigail wanted to invest immediately in government securities, but as she told Cotton Tufts, ‘Mr. Adams held to his faith in land as true wealth.’” (p.428)

            When Adams returned from Europe he was elected Vice President of the United States.  The first to hold this office, the record that Adams would set tie breaking votes he would cast as President of the Senate is a record that still stands to this day.  In 1796, he would go on to win the first contested presidential election in U.S. history.  As the first president ever to succeed a president he had no history to turn to.  He kept Washington’s entire cabinet that was loyal to Hamilton, instead of him, in office.  Adams would still manage to keep this country away from war with France and do so with America’s honor intact.  Yet he would lose the election of 1800.

“What was surprising—and would largely be forgotten as time went on—was how well Adams had done.  Despite the malicious attacks on him, the furor over the Alien and Sedition Acts, unpopular taxes, betrayals by his own cabinet, the disarray of the Federalists, and the final treachery of Hamilton, he had, in fact, come very close to winning in the electoral count.  With a difference of only 250 votes in New York City, Adams would have won with an electoral count of 71 to 61.  So another of the ironies of 1800 was that Jefferson, the apostle of agrarian America who loathed cities, owed his ultimate political triumph to New York.” (p.556)

            In his final public act he would choose John Marshall as Chief Justice of the United States.  As the famous scene played out Adams asked Marshall who he should appoint.  Marshall in response says he does not know.  Adams responds with ‘I think I will appoint you'.

“But it is probable that Adams knew exactly whom he would choose before Marshall even entered the room.  In many ways the nomination was inevitable.  Few men had so impressed Adams as Marshall, with his good sense and ability.  Nor had anyone shown greater loyalty.  He was Adams’s kind of Federalist and one who at forty-five—‘in the full vigor of middle age,’ as Adams said—could be expected to serve on the Court for years to come.  On January 31, 1801, at the President’s House, Adams signed Marshall’s commission as Chief Justice, which the Senate confirmed without delay.  In its far-reaching importance to the country, Adams appointment of Marshall was second only to his nomination of George Washington to command the Continental Army twenty-five years before.  Possibly the greatest Chief Justice in history, Marshall would serve on the Court for another thirty-four years.” (p.560)

John Adams is an incredible book about an incredible man.  McCullough writes in a manner that it is both readable and enjoyable.  The best part is you do not even have to study history on a regular basis to enjoy it.

{Scenes are taking from the HBO John Adams mini-series based on the book}