Title: The%20Day%20the%20Earth%20Stood%20Still
1The Day the Earth Stood Still
2The Political ContextCommunism After WWII
3The Political ContextFear of Communism
A 1947 comic book published by the Catechetical
Guild Educational Society warning of the supposed
dangers of a Communist takeover.
4The Political ContextThe Rosenbergs
- 1944 The Rosenbergs gave information about
atomic bomb to Russians - January March, 1951 The trial and death
sentences
5The Political ContextMcCarthyism and HUACLate
1940s to Late 1950s
- 1950 Alger Hiss trial
- Early 1950s Sam Jaffe blacklisted reduced to
teaching high school math and living with his
sisters.
6The Political ContextAtomic and Hydrogen Bombs
- 1945 US drops atomic bombs on Japan.
- 1949 Soviet Union tests first atomic weapon.
7The Political ContextFear of Nuclear Anihilation
1957
8The Other ExtremeCandide
1953 Playwright Lillian Hellman proposed to
Leonard Bernstein to adapt Voltaire's Candide for
the musical theater. Oh Happy We The Best
of All Possible Worlds Voltaire's novella of 1758
satirized the fashionable philosophies of his day
and, especially, the Catholic church whose
Inquisition routinely tortured and killed
"heretics" in a ghastly event known as an "Auto
da Fé" ("act of faith"). Hellman observed a
sinister parallel between the Inquisition's
church-sponsored purges and the "Washington Witch
Trials" being waged by the House Un-American
Activities Committee. Fueled by rage and
indignation, she began her adaptation of
Voltaire's book.
9Pygmalion
- In our image
- Klaatu
- Gort
- Seeking perfection
10Who Gets to Play God?
- Klaatus creation
- Klaatus resurection
11Running Amok
Or not