Talking about Alternate Histories on TV and Film

 

On the evening of February 15, 2023, I talked via Zoom to the Science Fiction Association of Bergen County about alternate history stories on TV and in the movies.

Among the shows I discussed were The Man in the High Castle, Hunters, The Plot Against America, Watchmen, For All Mankind, The Last of Us, Fatherland, Once Upon a Time … In Hollywood, & Juliet, It’s Real Life, and Snodgrass.

The Plot Against America Finale: Reality

As brilliant and memorable as The Man in the High Castle (in print and on the screen) was, it was a comic book adventure.  Complex, as alternate histories are bound to be, but still something in the world of fantasy not reality.  Though The Plot Against America may not be quite as memorable, it is just as brilliant in its own way.  And it is about reality.  Way too close to reality be just enjoyable.  It ends up being frightening, as even the most grim fantasy cannot really be.

Let's just look at the very ending.   There's a special election for President being held in 1942.  Mrs. Lindbergh has called upon Congress to authorize it, after her husband, the President, has disappeared.  There's hope, expectations, that FDR might reclaim the White House (earlier, Walter Winchell is assassinated).  But we see in the South, where African Americans are no doubt voting for Roosevelt, that ballots are being burned rather than counted.  There's word that FDR is also doing well in some northern states.  Will that be enough to restore decency and democracy to the USA?  That's where the mini-series ends.  Before a ballot is actually counted.  Just like where we are today, regarding our Presidential election scheduled for this coming November.

Philip Roth's book, upon which the mini-series was based, was written before Trump became President in our reality.  The mini-series wasn't.  Clearly David Simon, who has Homicide, The Wire, and Treme to his earlier illustrious credit, knew all about Trump in the White House, certainly when the ending of the mini-series was finalized.  Good for Simon for making this powerful statement.

Earlier in this finale, it gets about as ugly as an alternate history in which bigotry comes to power can be.  The Klan is running high.  The FBI is competing with the Gestapo.  All of that is all too reminiscent of our reality, too.

So, see The Plot Against America.  You'll be entertained by the Yiddish.  But you'll be horrified with how much of that alternate reality is not far from where America is today.

See also The Plot Against America 1.1: Yet Another Alternate Nazi History, with Forshpeis ... The Plot Against 1.2: The 33rd President ... The Plot Against America 1.3: Corrosive Anti-Semitism ... The Plot Against America 1.4: Close to Home ... The Plot Against America 1.5: Involuntary Transfer

 

The Plot Against America 1.5: Involuntary Transfer

Another powerful, deeply infuriating episode - 1.5 - in the 1940s alternate American history which has Lindbergh as President and anti-semitism rising that is The Plot Against America.

The main theme is the transfer of Jewish residents of Eastern cities to rural mid-America that Rabbi Lionel Bengelsdorf kept insisting was voluntary.  He and we learn the truth when he sees the rabid-anti-semite Henry Ford, a member of the Lindbergh cabinet, give his definition of voluntary.  If you want to keep your job, you agree to move your family.  What does the Rabbi need, to get him see how blind he is and has been?  The Lindberghs don't even attend his wedding.  And yet he continues to promote Lindbergh as the greatest thing since sliced bread in America.

As an example:  when Walter Winchell finally denounces the Rabbi's pet transfer program on Winchell's radio show with his breathless, patented voice, Bengelsdorf gets Winchell fired from his radio show.  I don't even know if there's an FCC in this alternate reality.  I do know that in our reality, I've frequently denounced the FCC and its regulation of broadcasters as a blatant violation of our First Amendment (see, for example, my Flouting of the First Amendment).

In The Plot Against America, the government being forbidden from abridging freedom of speech and press isn't the only egregious violation of the First Amendment.  Before the hour is over, we see a Winchell rally - he's starting a Presidential campaign - broken up by fascist thugs, with the local police and the FBI looking on and doing nothing.  So much for the right guaranteed in the First Amendment of people to peaceably assemble.

Next week is the finale, and I regret this series being so mini.   There's a lot more story to tell in this rise of fascism in America which almost happened - in the attack on the press by the President's minions which bear such resemblances to our own time.  I'll be back here next week with some parting thoughts on this all-too pertinent series.

See also The Plot Against America 1.1: Yet Another Alternate Nazi History, with Forshpeis ... The Plot Against 1.2: The 33rd President ... The Plot Against America 1.3: Corrosive Anti-Semitism ... The Plot Against America 1.4: Close to Home

 

The Plot Against America 1.4: Close to Home

The Plot Against America 1.4 continued last night with its subtle and not-so-subtle indications of America moving towards a Nazi regime.

In many ways, I found the most chilling indication to be in the subtle category, barely more than a split second in Washington, DC, with President Lindbergh hosting German Nazi Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop.  Rabbi Lionel Bengelsdorf, sucking up to every Lindbergh sympathizer he can find, convinced that the alternate-history President is not an anti-semite, seeks a brief word or two with the President.  Lindbergh barely acknowledges the Rabbi, and walks away.  The only possible meaning of this is that Lindbergh does not want to be seen comfortably conversing with a Jew with such important leaders of the Third Reich around.  Bengelsdorf of course must know this, but he lies to himself and Evelyn and seeks a conversation with the Vice President and cabinet member Henry Ford.  The Rabbi gets not more than a few moments from the VP, and Evelyn gets a dose of invective anti-semitism from Ford.

It's tough to see who is in greater denial, the Rabbi or Evelyn.  After cursing out Ford, in Yiddish my grandmother would have been proud of, Evelyn accepts von Ribbentrop's invitation to dance, and certainly seems to be enjoying the dance.  Maybe she's putting on an act, but the fact that we can't be sure says it all about her and her external acceptance of Lindbergh, bordering on collaboration with the Nazis.

Back in New Jersey, the signs of the Nazi ascension in America are a lot less subtle.  Unsurprisingly in Philip Roth's vision, the FBI is a more-than-willing tool of Lindbergh and his vision.  My late father, shortly after he passed the bar and began to practice law, sought to join the FBI.  They turned him down - because he was Jewish, he always insisted an at least honest FBI guy told him.  I believed him, and still do.

If I'm giving the impression that this series hits close to home, that's exactly what it does.  The Plot Against America is an increasingly powerful piece of television, and more relevant than ever in this age.

See also The Plot Against America 1.1: Yet Another Alternate Nazi History, with Forshpeis ... The Plot Against 1.2: The 33rd President ... The Plot Against America 1.3: Corrosive Anti-Semitism

 

The Plot Against America 1.3: Corrosive Anti-Semitism

A chilling episode 1.3 in the alternate history that is The Plot Against America, which explores the corrosive impact on anti-semitism on the Levine family, as they take a little vacation in Lindbergh's Washington, DC.

It's not that Lindbergh has specifically done anything against the Jews - at least, not yet.  It's that American bigots, who range from people in restaurants to people who run hotels, are beginning to voice and an act upon their anti-semitism.  And the helpful police warn Herman that their patience is wearing thin, when he complains when he and his wife and kids are thrown out of their hotel, merely because they are Jewish.

That scene sums up the stark difference between The Man in the High Castle and The Plot Against America.  The Nazis winning the war is a very different kind of alternate history than Nazi sympathizers slowly gaining control of the United States, against the backdrop of Hitler winning the war in Europe,

All of which makes Rabbi Bengelsdorf an even more inexplicable character.  Surely he knows what Herman has seen and experienced.   I get that he's against the war, and therefore strongly supports Lindbergh's isolationism.   But how can the Rabbi turn a blind eye to Jews being publicly badmouthed and thrown out of restaurants?  And if Bengelsdorf  is inexplicable, Evelyn Finkel is even more so.   She'll soon know exactly what her sister's family experienced.  And the coming attractions show that she still defends Bengelsdorf  - ok, she loves him - and Lindbergh.  Could love go that far?

Well, though The Plot Against America addresses the real anti-semitism in America that simmered in the 1930s and the 1940s, the Levines are fictional characters, as is Bengelsdorf, so anything can happen.

See also The Plot Against America 1.1: Yet Another Alternate Nazi History, with Forshpeis ... The Plot Against 1.2: The 33rd President

 

The Plot Against America 1.2: The 33rd President

A powerful second episode of The Plot Against America, with its now patented mix of sharp historical details and disturbing alternate history.

The details again range from rarely heard Yiddish, like bahaimhe for cow, to those light green semi-translucent dishes on the table.  And the delicatessen looked so good I could taste it.

The alternate reality was equally, if verging on tragically, convincing.  Lindbergh, running on a me vs. war platform, beats Roosevelt in his quest for a third term in 1940.  We learn this by witnessing the Levins learning of this via the radio in their living room.  Though I knew this was going to happen in this story, it was a blow, anyway, offered at almost the same time as Herman Levin ducks into his Newark moviehouse to see the Nazis taking over Europe.  The mix of movies and radio indeed typified this time - nothing alternate about their role in history - and The Plot Against America's employment of newsreels and radio to convey its narrative makes its alternate history all the more real.

The other smack-in-your-face element is Rabbi Lionel Bengelsdorf's support of Lindbergh in his campaign for President.  The character is all the more horrifying because he's played the charismatic John Tuturro.  Bengelsdorf is so charismatic, so sure of his beliefs and so well spoken, that he even attracts Evelyn Finkel played by Winona Ryder.   Is he based on a real person?  Not that I know of, and I suppose that's one optimistic aspect of this frightening story.

Lindbergh's election as the 33rd American President means the pace of this short series will be quickening.  Alvin Levin has gone to Canada to enlist in their armed forces because he want to "kill Nazis".  Will America with Lindbergh in the White House offer Britain and Churchill no help in their heroic attempt to stave off Hitler?

I'll be back here with my report next week.

See also The Plot Against America 1.1: Yet Another Alternate Nazi History, with Forshpeis

 

The Plot Against America 1.1: Yet Another Alternate Nazi History, with Forshpeis

I find myself in the less than jubilant position of reviewing the third television science fiction series about Nazis - science fiction, loosely defined - in the past three days.  The first would be Hunters (my review here), the second Westworld (more, precisely it's season three coda; my review here), and now The Plot to Against America on HBO.  I'll leave it to you to explain why Nazis are so popular on American television these days.

The Plot hinges on Charles Lindbergh, who in real history was a non-interventionist and likely Nazi sympathizer in the 1930s, bur did fight against the Nazis and Japanese in the Second World War. In the television series, he beats FDR in the Presidential election of 1940, and (though I haven't read the 2004 novel by Philip Roth or seen more than the first episode of the series) presides over an America in which anti-semitism is rampant.

Philip Roth and Philip K. Dick are two very different kinds of brilliant writers, so don't expect any Man in the High Castle (in my view, probably the best science fiction series ever on television) in The Plot Against America alternate history.  Instead, think about Roth's other notable works, like Goodbye Columbus, which focus on the pleasures and problems of Jewish life in mid-20th-century New Jersey.  You'll find lots of that in the first episode of The Plot Against America, which introduces the extended Levin family, its struggle to move up in the middle class and fend off the rising Nazi tide. 

The details in 1940 Newark are spot on, ranging from the Esso gas station to the clothing to the Yiddish sprinkled in the conversations.  This has to be the first time I've heard the word forshpeis in an American TV drama.  It brings back wonderful memories of both my grandmother's voice and her forshpeis.   

The acting in The Plot Against America is top-drawer, too, with Winona Ryder, John Turturro, and David Krumholtz in important roles, eating rolls that made me hungry, and I'll be back here next week with a review of the second episode.