All the Way

A Play

Robert Schenkkan

• Publisher: Grove Press
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9780802191731
• Topic: Literatur
• Subtopic: Amerikanische Dramaturgie

This Tony Award–winning, "jaw-dropping political drama" chronicles LBJ's fight for the Civil Rights Act and includes an introduction by Bryan Cranston ( Variety ). Winner of the 2014 Tony Award for Best Play, as well as Best Play awards from the New York Drama Critics' Circle, the Outer Critics Circle, the Drama League, and numerous other awards, All the Way is a masterful exploration of politics and power from the Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright Robert Schenkkan. All the Way tells the story of the tumultuous first year of Lyndon Baines Johnson's presidency. Thrust into power following the Kennedy assassination and facing an upcoming election, Johnson is nevertheless determined to end the legacy of racial injustice in America and rebuild it into the Great Society—by any means necessary. In order to pass the landmark 1964 Civil Rights bill, LBJ struggles to overpower an intransigent Congress while also attempting to forge a compromise with Martin Luther King, Jr., and navigate the increasingly fractious Civil Rights Movement. Breaking Bad star Bryan Cranston played President Johnson in the play's celebrated Broadway production, for which he was awarded the Tony Award for Best Actor. In this edition, Cranston provides an illuminating and personal introduction.

ACT ONE

In the half-light, the company enters and takes their place in the witness boxes. LBJ moves DSC. The TB flickers to life with static like an old-fashioned black and white TV. The “Holding Pattern” appears—the famous American Indian Head. Then the countdown: TEN. NINE. EIGHT. SEVEN. SIX. FIVE. FOUR. THREE. TWO. ONE.

Screen goes white. Fades to Titles:

NOVEMBER, 1963

SPOT ON on LBJ.

LBJ I’m back in the Hill Country in the old days, hidin’ down in the root cellar while a Comanche war party searches through the house just over my head, huntin’ for me. It’s so dark down there; like a grave. For this terrible moment, I wonder if I’m dead already, or buried alive. I piss myself like an idiot child crouchin’ in the dirt knowing it’s only a matter of time now before they find the trap door; discover me; haul me, screaming, up into the light where their knives gleam . . .

The Witnesses simultaneously strike the stage three times. With each strike, another image of President Kennedy’s car entering Dealy Plaza appears on the TB. Last image fades out with SPOT on LBJ as . . .

LADY BIRD gently shakes LBJ’s shoulder.

LADY BIRD JOHNSON Lyndon? Wake up, honey. We’re about to land in Washington.

Lady Bird stands on one side of LBJ as WALTER JENKINS, his long-time aide, stands on the other. LBJ wipes the sleep off his face. They talk quietly; urgently.

LBJ You hear from Bobby?

WALTER JENKINS He’ll be waiting on the tarmac. There’ll be Reporters, too; you’ll be expected to make a statement. Something short. Then we’ll go straight to Blair House.

LBJ Reach out to the leadership as soon as we hit the ground; I wanta talk to each and every one of ’em. Today. Now.

WALTER JENKINS Yes, sir.

LBJ (to Lady Bird) You call Rose Kennedy?

LADY BIRD JOHNSON Yes.

LBJ Lord, what that woman’s been through. Your lipstick.

LADY BIRD JOHNSON What?

LBJ Fix your lipstick. How did John Connally’s surgery go?

LADY BIRD JOHNSON The doctors are optimistic.

LBJ Thank God for that. (glancing about cautiously) Jackie?

LADY BIRD JOHNSON Won’t change her clothes. Says she “wants them to see what they have done to Jack.”

LBJ See the way she stared at me when I was taking the oath?

LADY BIRD JOHNSON She’s upset, honey . . .

LBJ We’re all upset, Bird! (quieter) We’re all upset. (to Walter) A televised address to both Houses of Congress as soon as it seems decent.

Sound of plane landing as LIGHTS widen. We are now in the Senate chamber. As LBJ moves past the CONGRESSMEN, they each lower their heads and murmur respectfully . . .

WITNESSES Mr. President. Mr. President. Mr. President.

LBJ stops. He is now addressing the Senate.

LBJ All I have I would have given gladly not to be standin’ here today. The greatest leader of our time has been struck down by the foulest deed of our time. No words are sad enough to express our sense of loss. John F. Kennedy told his countrymen that our national work would not be finished in the life of this administration, nor even perhaps in our lifetime. But,” he said, “let us begin.” Today, I would say to all my fellow Americans, let us continue.

Applause.

We have talked long enough in this country about civil rights. We have talked for one hundred years or more. It is time now to write the next chapter in the books of law. I urge you again, as I did in ’57 and again in ’60, to enact a civil rights law so that we can move to eliminate from this Nation every trace of discrimination that is based upon race or color.

The SENATORS and REPRESENTATIVES are surprised. They begin to applaud, the applause grows wild and cuts off abruptly as LIGHTS SHIFT. Oval Office.

In contrast to the subdued, dignified nature of his House speech, LBJ is loud, aggressive, and multi-tasking. As LBJ fields phone calls and questions his aides, his TAILOR measures him for a new suit.

TB board reads: 11 MONTHS TO THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION.

SECRETARY Senator Humphrey on One.

ADD SPOT on SENATOR HUBERT HUMPHREY on phone. LBJ picks up phone.

LBJ Hubert! You hear what that nigra comedian, Dick Gregory, said about me? “When Lyndon Johnson finished his speech, twenty million Negroes unpacked!”

LBJ and Humphrey laugh.

SENATOR HUBERT HUMPHREY It was a fine speech, Mr. President, dear to my heart, but I know some people are wondering, did he really mean it?

LBJ You can tell that Liberal crowd of yours, I’m gonna out-Roosevelt Roosevelt and out-Lincoln Lincoln! But they need to get behind me and back me up ’cause you know Dick Russell and the Dixiecrats are gonna fight me tooth and nail on this civil rights stuff. (covering phone/to his Tailor) Not too tight in the bunghole, there, Manny. And gimme some extra room in the pockets there for my stuff, my knife and my keys, and leave me some slack for my nutsack. WALTER, GET ME DICK RUSSELL! (back on ph...