Ken Burns on His War of Independence Project: ‘We Won’t Work on a More Important Film’
Ken Burns has evolved into beyond being a historical storyteller; he represents an institution, an unparalleled production entity. When he has documentary series heading for the television, everyone seeks a part of him.
The filmmaker completed “an astonishing number of podcasts”, he remarks, nearing the end of nine-month promotional tour that included 40 cities, numerous film showings plus countless media sessions. “There seems to be a podcast for every citizen, and I believe I’ve appeared on most of them.”
Thankfully the filmmaker is incredibly dynamic, as loquacious behind the mic as he is prolific during post-production. The veteran director has gone everywhere from Monticello to The Joe Rogan Experience to discuss a career-defining series: his Revolutionary War documentary, a monumental six-part, 12-hour documentary series that consumed ten years of his career and debuted recently on public television.
Timeless Filmmaking Method
Like slow cooking in an age of fast food, Burns’ latest project is defiantly traditional, evoking memories of The World at War rather than contemporary digital documentaries and podcast series.
For the documentarian, whose entire filmography chronicling strands of US history spanning various American subjects, the revolutionary period represents more than another topic but fundamental. “I said this to my co-director Sarah Botstein during our discussions, and she shared this view: this represents our most significant project Burns contemplates by phone from New York.
Comprehensive Scholarly Work
Burns and his collaborators and screenwriter Geoffrey Ward utilized thousands of books and primary source materials. Numerous scholars, representing diverse viewpoints, offered expert analysis together with prominent academics covering various specialties including slavery, indigenous peoples’ narratives and the British empire.
Signature Documentary Style
The documentary’s methodology will feel familiar to viewers of Burns’ earlier work. The characteristic technique included slow pans and zooms over historical images, abundant historical musical selections with performers reading diaries, letters and speeches.
This period represented Burns established his reputation; decades afterwards, currently the elder statesman of documentary filmmaking, he seems able to recruit numerous talented actors. Collaborating with the filmmaker during a recent appearance, acclaimed writer Lin-Manuel Miranda commented: “When Ken Burns calls, you say ‘Yes.’”
Extraordinary Talent
The extended filming period also helped regarding scheduling. Recordings took place in studios, in relevant places using online technology, a method utilized during the pandemic. Burns explains collaborating with actor Josh Brolin, who found a few free hours in Atlanta to record his lines portraying the founding father prior to departing to other professional obligations.
Brolin is joined by Kenneth Branagh, Hugh Dancy, Claire Danes, established Hollywood talent, Domhnall Gleeson, Amanda Gorman, Jonathan Groff, Tom Hanks, Ethan Hawke, Maya Hawke, accomplished dramatic artists, British and American talent, Edward Norton, David Oyelowo, Mandy Patinkin, small and big screen veterans, and many others.
The filmmaker continues: “Frankly, this may be the best single cast recruited for any project. They do an extraordinary service. Their celebrity status wasn’t the criteria. I became frustrated when someone asked, about the prominent cast. I explained, ‘These are artists.’ They are among the world’s best performers and they can bring this stuff alive.”
Multifaceted Story
Still, no contemporary observers remain, photography and newsreels forced Burns and his team to rely extensively on primary texts, combining the first-person voices of multiple revolutionary participants. This allowed them to present viewers not just the famous founders of the revolution but also to “dozens of others crucial to understanding, many of whom never even had a portrait painted.
Burns also indulged his particular enthusiasm for maps and spatial representation. “I love maps,” he observes, “featuring increased geographical representation throughout this series versus earlier productions across my complete filmography.”
Worldwide Consequences
The production crew recorded across multiple important places throughout the continent and in London to preserve geographical atmosphere and collaborated substantially with re-enactors. Various aspects converge to depict events more bloody, multifaceted and world-changing than the one taught in schools.
The revolution, it contends, was no mere parochial quarrel over land, taxation and representation. Instead the film portrays a brutal conflict that finally engaged numerous countries and unexpectedly manifested what it calls “the noble aspirations of humankind”.
Brother Against Brother
Initial complaints and protests leveled at London by far-flung British subjects across thirteen rebellious territories soon descended into a vicious internal war, setting brother against brother and neighbour against neighbour. During the second installment, the historian Alan Taylor observes: “The main misapprehension about the American Revolution involves believing it represented that unified Americans. It leaves out the reality that colonists battled fellow colonists.”
Nuanced Understanding
In his view, the revolution is a story that “generally suffers from excessive romance and idealization and is incredibly superficial and fails to properly acknowledge actual events, and all the participants and the widespread bloodshed.”
It was, he contends, a movement that announced the transformative concept of the unalienable rights of people; a brutal civil war, dividing revolutionaries and royalists; and a global war, continuing previous patterns of struggles among European powers for dominance in the New World.
Uncertain Historical Outcomes
The filmmaker also sought {to rediscover the
