Ragtime (1981)

A young black pianist becomes embroiled in the lives of an upper-class white family set among the racial tensions, infidelity, violence, and other nostalgic events in early 1900s New York City.

Director:

Milos Forman

Writers:

E.L. Doctorow (based on the novel by), Michael Weller (screenplay),

Stars:

James Cagney, Brad Dourif, Elizabeth McGovern

Nominated for 8 Oscars. Another 2 wins & 12 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
James Cagney	...	New York Police Commissioner Rhinelander Waldo
Brad Dourif	...	Younger Brother
Moses Gunn	...	Booker T. Washington
Elizabeth McGovern	...	Evelyn Nesbit
Kenneth McMillan	...	Willie Conklin
Pat O'Brien	...	Delphin
Donald O'Connor	...	Evelyn's Dance Instructor
James Olson	...	Father
Mandy Patinkin	...	Tateh
Howard E. Rollins Jr.	...	Coalhouse Walker Jr.
Mary Steenburgen	...	Mother
Debbie Allen	...	Sarah
Jeffrey DeMunn	...	Houdini (as Jeff Demunn)
Robert Joy	...	Henry Thaw
Norman Mailer	...	Stanford White

Storyline

The story runs in the 1910's New York. Coalhouse Walker Jr. is a black piano player. He has won fame and fortune playing with a jazz band. Some white men do not like this situation, and one day they assault him and spoil his brand new car. Walker tries by all means to get justice, without an answer...

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Plot Keywords:

car | 1910s | pianist | piano | new york city | 

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Taglines:

The passion, the violence, the birth of America's Gilded Age.

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Genres:

Drama

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Certificate:

PG

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

8 January 1982 (USA)

Also Known As:

Bir Zamanlar

Filming Locations:

81 West Main Street, Mt. Kisco, New York, USA

Box Office

Gross:

SEK 3,022,477 (Sweden)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Dino De Laurentiis Company, Sunley Productions Ltd.

Technical Specs

Runtime:

155 min

Sound Mix:

Stereo

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Milos Forman hired Donald O'Connor at the request of James Cagney. O'Connor had been having personal and professional problems, and Cagney wanted to help him.

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Goofs

During the 11th Street scene when Mandy Patinkin learns of his wife's infidelity, the same mustachioed actor with a bowler hat, vest, and cigar walks past him twice in a period of a couple of seconds.

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Quotes

Younger Brother: I design fireworks. That's my job.
[the black anarchists laugh in derision]
Younger Brother: . I can make bombs.
[They stop laughing and take him seriously]

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Connections

Featured in James Cagney: That Yankee Doodle Dandy (1981)

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Soundtracks

"ONE MORE HOUR"
(1981)
Words & Music by Randy Newman
Sung by Jennifer Warnes

User Reviews

Ragtime Era Tragedy

Back in the day when Hollywood was grinding out B westerns it wasn't unusual at all to see famous folks of the west in stories that had absolutely nothing to do with their own lives or to see many famous people interacting when they never even met in real life.

Ragtime revives some of that dubious tradition in filming E.L. Doctorow's novel about the Teddy Roosevelt years of the first decade of the last century. Teddy figures into this briefly as does his Vice President Charles Fairbanks. Booker T. Washington is here too, as are the principals of the Stanford White murder, and New York City Police Commissioner Rhinelander Waldo.

It's quite a blend because Roosevelt and Fairbanks ran for re-election in 1904 as Fairbanks is shown delivering a campaign speech. He wasn't even Vice President then, just a Senator from Indiana. Fairbanks was running for Vice President because Roosevelt had no Vice President in his first term. He succeeded to the presidency when Willima McKinley was assassinated.

The Stanford White murder took place in 1906 and was then called the crime of the century. Many such murders right up to O.J. Simpson were given that dubious distinction. And Rhinelander Waldo was not NYPD Police Commissioner until 1910 and he was much younger than James Cagney.

Still and all E.L. Doctorow's book is made into a fine film which got a whole bunch of Academy Award nominations including Best Picture, Best Director for Milos Forman and Supporting player nominations for Howard Rollins, Jr. and Elizabeth McGovern.

The main story is about Coalhouse Walker, Jr. a black ragtime pianist and his Sarah. She has his baby and they'd like to get married. But a whole lot of things, some of them peripherally connected to the true events and people previously mentioned that lead him and a gang to take possession of the Morgan Library and threaten to blow it up.

Howard Rollins was a real tragedy. This was a great start to a short, but brilliant career that included his long running role as Virgil Tibbs in the TV series In the Heat of the Night and the film A Soldier's Story. He died way too young from AIDS contracted from a lot of intravenous drug use.

Elizabeth McGovern is the famous Evelyn Nisbet, the girl on the red velvet swing which was the title of another film that dealt with the Stanford White murder. McGovern's performance is probably closer to the real Evelyn than Joan Collins was in that earlier film. She's basically a goldigger who juggled two men, her husband Harry K. Thaw and her upscale lover, society architect Stanford White. Her circus act led to White's death, Thaw's commitment to an insane asylum and a vaudeville career for her.

Ragtime was eagerly awaited because of the anticipated return of James Cagney to the screen after being off for 19 years. Cagney is clearly aged, but he gets through the role because unlike that television film Terrible Joe Moran, he's not the center of the film, though he's first billed. Note that he's sitting down during most of his performance and when he has to stand the camera is a discreet distance. It's nothing like the bouncing Cagney of old, but light years better than Terrible Joe Moran.

This was also the final joint appearance as it turned for the team that invented the buddy film, James Cagney and Pat O'Brien even though they have no scenes together. O'Brien is Harry K. Thaw's attorney and Mrs. O'Brien plays Thaw's mother under her maiden name of Eloise Taylor. She was an actress before she married Pat, but gave up her career to raise their four children.

Author Norman Mailer plays Stanford White, fulltime architect and hedonist and Robert Joy plays the demented millionaire Harry K. Thaw and both fit the parts perfectly. Maybe one day we will have a definitive film version just concentrating on the murder and it's aftermath for the three principals.

Milos Forman gave us a remarkable evocation of an exciting time in American history. It seemed that America had limitless possibilities then. I doubt they'll be saying that about the first decade of this century.