We Need to Talk about Jack Kelly, Class Traitor
- clairealsto
- Jul 25, 2021
- 4 min read
Joseph Pulitzer: That man is a socialist.
Mr. Seitz, editor of the World: Teddy Roosevelt is no socialist. He’s an American hero.
-- Newsies, act 1, scene II
The OG: better politics, Idina Menzel's boo, Patrick's Mom, the secondhand cringe for Christian Bale's Santa Fe Dance that's more vicariously embarrassing than anything Steve Carrell has ever done, what's not to like?
Patrick's mom is one of my vocal idols--- that endless 80's-era blendybelty mezzo-- she's credited as Jo Ann Harris, but I can't even confirm if she did the singing!
Every other day on the bird app, someone lauds Newsies as a leftist text due to its “pro-union” stance. To an extent, I can relate: such energetic choreography and enthusiastic choruses could sweep anyone up into a labor rights frenzy; however, aside from the flawless jetés, everyone’s favorite musical about collective organizing is not beyond criticism.
I love a good Seize the Day dance break though!
The denouement is rife with major issues, and I think they’re worth examining because Jack Kelly’s dark descent into bourgeois comfort in the Finale Ultimo could be redeemed as a cautionary tale. Because we’ve got unions in real life. I want workers to succeed. I want to be able to recognize the ways in which institutions suppress workers and get away with it.
Fortunately for the sake of that dialogue, Newsies holds the mirror up to society, with the following warnings:
1. Which power players are actually making the bargain? Pay attention to the unholy union of government and private business sneaking in at the very end of the Newsies stage musical, vis a vis the “Governor Roosevelt” character.
Despite a smattering of federal regulations and a long list of national parks to his credit, the real-life Theodore Roosevelt is not one of my heroes, to say the least. Roosevelt, as perhaps the most famous proponent of the term “bully” as a synonym for “really great,” would probably disapprove of my use of “bully” to mean “junior high nightmare” and would definitely disagree with my assertion that he was one... but on a scale much, much larger than the schoolyard.
What’s more, as a violent imperialist, his hipster rehabilitation — literally, I think people confuse him with Ron Swanson because of the mustache —- gives me indigestion. I don’t think it is advisable (or accurate) to give such a bloodthirsty warmonger a largely benign role in a family-friendly musical.
Roosevelt’s appearance in the musical stems from his real-life gubernatorial reforms in the era of muckrakers and activists like Jacob Riis and Florence Kelley. His first contribution to the plot is arresting the corrupt warden who has subjected Crutchie and other children to unlivable conditions. In the movie, this is his only function; Roosevelt never interacts with Pulitzer.
Historically, after a 2-week strike that reduced paper sales by two-thirds, the New York World and the New York Journal struck a deal with the newsies. The movie gives David and Jack a conversation with Pulitzer:/
DAVID: You talk about self interest, but since the strike, your circulation’s been down 70%. Everyday you’re losing thousands of dollars just to beat us out of one lousy tenth of a cent. Why?
JACK: You see, it ain’t about the money, Dave. If Joe gives in to nobodies like us, it means we got the power. And he can’t do that, no matter what it costs. Am I right, Joe?
Ultimately, Pulitzer is swayed by the large crowd of screaming children outside his window.
However, the stage musical ends on a particularly bleak note by inserting Theodore Roosevelt as the deus ex machina. He pressures Pulitzer to end the strike by threatening to investigate the working conditions in the media titan’s paper.
Worker agency is not the deciding factor in resolving the strike; Teddy Roosevelt’s “big stick” is.
Since Pulitzer caves on the strike, Roosevelt does not make good on his threat. Newsies’ Roosevelt exerts his influence over the abuses of power in one specific situation and, instead of addressing known additional issues, he compromises: he makes the conscious choice not to address structural inequality across the industry or even within one (1) company!
2. Follow the money: what is really getting redistributed? At the end of the day, Pulitzer still owns the World. The same egregiously wealthy man’s private company funds the newspaper when the curtain goes up and when it goes down. The striking newsies disrupt one step in the production line and co-opt a busted old printing press, and it works: they draw attention to their grievances and stir up support. But in my ideal “World,” they’d keep going. Seize the means of production!
Not only does Pulitzer maintain his grip on the World, but he even stands to profit!
3. Does change really come, “once and for all?” Unfortunately, the stage musical does not leave me with high hopes for Davey’s little brother. The kid is screwed... at least until child labor laws are enacted. Any subsequent labor negotiations will have to start all over again: big business preys on union leadership and the union doesn’t survive to protect its workers in the future.
Historically, internal conflict had already imperiled the newsboy union by the time the 1899 strike ended -- the union leaders were rumored to have accepted bribes, precipitating a hasty turnover in its officers -- and it disbanded altogether once an agreement was reached.
The musical script gives no suggestion of a future for the union beyond the crisis moment. While the union’s status is unstated, Pulitzer’s manipulation of vulnerable workers is explicit: in a new choice that makes the stage protagonist morally inferior to Christian Bale’s more principled cinematic hero, Jack Kelly accepts a bribe (though he later returns the money… once the strike has proved popular enough to succeed on its own terms.)
And then, union president Jack Kelly accepts a white-collar job working for Pulitzer. (I just want to say: 1992 Christian Bale Jack Kelly would never do this!)
Newly in league with his former nemesis, Jack Kelly’s fate is sealed. His upward trajectory cements his ultimate separation from his former peers -- a distance farther than Santa Fe from New York.
Far be it from me to call for the cancellation of Jack Kelly. I think a person can enjoy listening to Newsies and still pick it apart: that is a central conceit of this whole blog shebang. But Newsies has a very engineered feel, like profit machines with a sophisticated algorithm, supplying audiences with a particular ending and calling it “happy.”
Maybe we need to embrace Newsies as Jack Kelly’s personal tragedy.
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