http://www.bhamweekly.com/article.php?article_id=00923
Project 1968 provides a dramatic re-imagining of that year's
Democratic Convention
By: Courtney Haden
As the orchestrated pageantry of the 2008 Democratic Convention
nears, it's worth going back 40 years to examine a convention where
chaos took center stage and the pageantry was in the streets. Author
and playwright Laura Axelrod, a Cullman resident and self-styled
political agnostic, takes that trip every day online in an episodic
narrative she calls a "docu-novel", adapted for the web from a stage
play she began writing in 2004. Project 1968 recounts the events of
that pivotal year through the experiences of two young women, Amy and
Janine, who wind up in Chicago that fateful week.
BIRMINGHAM WEEKLY: What interests you so about this event that took
place before you were even born?
LAURA AXELROD: Everything came to a head in '68. There was a
tremendous sense of empowerment, that people had a say in government,
in how people lived their lives. They wanted to do things
differently. It was an idealistic time, and I think people were
trying to live as authentically as possible, according to their values...
Everything crested and then fell apart because there were mistakes
that were made that led to the chaos of the Chicago convention. I
look at the rhetoric of the Yippies [Youth International Party
radical activists] now and I think, could any of that have played out
now? And I think people would disappear, quite frankly. [laughs]
A lot of the Eisenhower Commission reports I read in Austin at the
Lyndon Baines Johnson Presidential Library. They have a couple of
boxes that are just filled with people's experiences at the
convention they were interviewed and some of them are brutal.
They took it from all different sides; people who were delegates,
people who were just visiting from Europe, to protesters really
powerful stuff.
BW: At what point did you decide to change this story from the small
focus of the stage to the broader panorama of a docu-novel?
LA: It was an interesting idea for a couple of reasons. One, American
history should belong to everybody; why open it up just for people
who can afford a ticket to a play? The second thing was the idea of
blending fact with fiction to document my story. Based on my
research, I think there are a lot of books out there that're
historically inaccurate...
To map this out daily, it's like these characters are alive, so as I
live my day, I think about how they're living their day.
BW: So, there are aspects of your own personality in Amy and Janine?
LA: Yeah. Janine reminds me of how I was back when I was politically
active in my college years. She's 18 and hopefully a little more
naïve than I was.
BW: The last time you voted was the last time you attended a
political convention.
LA: The first and the last time. I was a campaign worker for Jerry
Brown [in 1992]. It was a cool experience to go to a convention like
that, but to go as the unwanted I mean, the attitude was, 'You're
ruining our convention, you're ruining our party, go away.' We were
really idealistic, but also artistic, so when we weren't on the
convention floor, we were trading buttons.
BW: Why should we even have conventions anymore?
LA: '68 had all the markings of being out of control. [Chicago mayor]
Richard Daley was trying to control every aspect of the convention
and I think they learned a lesson there. That things have to be
presentable, to make it seem like the party is presidential. If they
can't control their own convention, how're they going to deal with the country?
Lester Maddox [segregationist governor of Georgia] had entered the
nominating process and you get the feeling that the leadership of the
Democratic party had no idea how to bring everybody back in line.
When I look at the news these days, it's like, everybody has to get
their ducks in a row, everybody has to fall into place.
BW: And yet Obama's people think it's a good idea to offer Hillary
Clinton a roll call vote, which would seem to fly in the face of the
idea that disharmony makes bad TV.
LA: The gut feeling I have is that a lot of women felt left out of
the process and are really angry. Because of the sexism. From what
I've looked at in the media, it's hard to ignore that...
That's part of the reason for Project 1968, to look at the role of
women and how women's voices really aren't heard in the political
process. Instead, we wind up talking about what a candidate wore, or
her marriage...
I'm not sure who I support these days. Probably Eugene McCarthy [laughs]...
I personally say that this is a demoralized society. I heard that on
a radio show and I believe that to be true. People just shrug and
say, well, you can't fight City Hall... I wonder why the Baby Boomers
didn't teach my generation I'm probably effectively Generation X
how to become politically active, how to represent ourselves in
politics. Maybe it had something to do with '68.
BW: Have you thought about a story arc for your characters beyond 1968?
LA: Yeah, I pretty much have mapped them out through 1978. There may
be a leap in the story at some point. The choices they make now [in
1968] determine how they live the rest of their lives.
BW: Much as the political choices made in 1968 still have
ramifications far beyond that year.
LA: Right. Yes...
I'm trying not to let 1968 take over too much of my personal life.
It's hard to explain to people that what happened 40 years ago, to me
is currently happening, so it's kind of a weird alienation from the present.
--
The day-by-day experiences of Amy and Janine, replete with vintage
reportage from national papers and new interviews conducted by Laura
Axelrod, are yours to explore at www.project1968.com.
--
Courtney Haden is a Birmingham Weekly columnist. Write to
courtney@bhamweekly.com
.
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