Terrific miniseries coming up on HBO. By Dave Shiflett (Bloomberg) – Roll over, Sam Adams. Cousin John is about to eclipse you. Though he was the nation’s first vice president, second president and a prime mover in the American revolution, John Adams has not enjoyed the prominence of Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Benjamin Franklin or even cousin Sam Adams, who enjoys high name recognition due to association with a popular grog. A new HBO miniseries debuting March 16 at 8 p.m. New York time, should help remedy all that. Based on the Pulitzer prize-winning book by David McCullough, executive-produced by Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman, and directed by Tom Hooper, “Sam Adams” is a substantial piece of work that brings its subject fully from history’s shadow. Paul Giamatti plays a slightly chunky, deeply passionate and somewhat vain Adams, while Laura Linney, as Abigail Adams, portrays a formidable woman every bit his husband’s match. Both turn in spectacular performances over the course of the seven-part series. The story begins March 5, 1770 in Boston, then a town of around 15,000, where the natives made the unwise decision to shower British troops with ice, stones, and oyster shells. The resulting massacre killed five Americans (a routine mall shooting in our time), stoked the fires of revolution and brought Adams, a lawyer, to prominence as the soldiers’ legal counsel. Adams convinced a jury that the Brits fired in self defense, saving them from the noose. He would soon advocate war against the mother country. If the film has a central message it is that Adams was every bit the equal of Thomas Jefferson (Stephen Dillane), George Washington (David Morse), and Ben Franklin (Tom Wilkinson), the latter portrayed as part weasel, part wise man, and a highly accomplished bon vivant. “I am an extreme moderate,” Franklin tells Adams early on. “My opinion is that I have no opinion.” Some viewers may detect more than a hint of a contemporary politician in Franklin. Shot largely in Virginia, the film is rich in memorable scenes. After Adams insists that Jefferson write the Declaration of Independence, the sage of Monticello brings in his draft for peer review. By Jefferson’s accounting men have rights that are “sacred and undeniable” yet Franklin disagrees, saying TJ’s formulation “smacks of the pulpit.” He suggests “self-evident.” Jefferson, radiating a profound though silent exasperation, is not destined to win this argument. Writers in the audience are thus reminded editors are an eternal curse. A searing tar and feathering scene depicts the horrors of the mob while perhaps the most memorable, and wrenching, scene depicts Abigail having herself and her children inoculated for smallpox. While today’s vaccines come in vials, here the local doctor carts in a pustule-encrusted child whose eyes roll back as he clutches a cross. His hideous sores are lanced and the proceeds implanted in Abigail and her children, one of whom barely survives. It is difficult to find fault with the nearly three-hour opening; if a warning is due it is that the series may be a challenge to casual viewers. Writer Kirk Ellis‘s script reminds us that Adams and his contemporaries did not spend their formative years playing video games, but instead reading Latin and Greek. The dialogue is elevated (and obscenity-free); one almost imagines Hanks and company toying with the idea of subtitles. Ellis provides many other details illustrating the vast difference between Adams’ world and ours. The colonials were cold in the winter, hot in the summer, and decidedly short on appliances. We see Abigail scrubbing the floors with vinegar and a brick and John writing some of history’s most enduring documents with the help of his era’s word processor: the quill. Yet for all his brilliance he was not unfamiliar with illiteracy. “My mother could not read,” he tells Abigail. The series, which will air at 9 p.m. on subsequent Sundays through April 20, follows Adams to Europe, back the United States, and through his tumultuous years as vice president and president, ending on July 4,1826, the day Adams and Jefferson, who parted ways but eventually reconciled, die. Hanks and company have brought John Adams brilliantly back to life. Perhaps someone should name a commodity after him – a fine claret seems just about right. Dave Shiflett is a critic for Bloomberg News. The opinions expressed are his own. To contact the writer of this story: Dave Shiflett at dshifl@aol.com.
