New Play on Broadway

The Gang's All Here (by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee) has the authors of Inherit the Wind once again flipping back in U.S. history to the real life 19203, this time to Warren G. Harding under the name of Griffith P. Hastings. Their portrait is a largely familiar one of a genial poker-playing mediocrity who is hoisted into the White House. His cronies are crooks whom he turns into Cabinet members and on whose strong right claws he leans for support. At the end the authors portray a Harding who commits suicide,* but not until he has been roused (by what he unwillingly learns) to responsible action.

Using simple strokes and surefire cliches, always working from the outside out, now shaking their heads over what goes on and now smacking their lips, Playwrights Lawrence and Lee give their play a fair amount of story interest and shock value, while Actor Melvyn Douglas, with a brilliant impersonation, wins sympathy for their hero. But wherever the pull of the play is not purely factual it seems flagrantly fictional, particularly in a weak last act. It brings no insight to any of the questions it raises. It gets beneath none of the skin it flays. Nor does The Gang's All Here always jibe with the facts. Harding (inside the party) was no such convention dark horse as he is made out to be; nor was he quite such an incredible babe in the wood; nor did he gain so much stature at the end. There are several good performances in the play, and Jo Mielziner has designed some attractive sets. But they frame a story whose only asset is its effective storytelling.

* Announced cause of death: apoplexy.

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