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Ken Burns has become not just a historical storyteller; he is a brand, an unparalleled production entity. When he has television endeavor heading for the PBS network, everyone seeks a part of him.

Burns has done “more fucking podcasts than I ever thought possible”, he remarks, nearing the end of his marathon promotional journey comprising 40 cities, 80 screenings and innumerable conversations. “I think there are 340.1m podcasts, one for every American, and I’ve done half of them.”

Happily Burns is a force of nature, as expressive in conversation as he is productive while filmmaking. The veteran director has appeared at locations ranging from Monticello to popular podcasts to discuss a career-defining series: The American Revolution, an extensive six-episode, twelve-hour film project that consumed ten years of his career and premiered this week on PBS.

Timeless Filmmaking Method

Like slow cooking in an age of fast food, Burns’ latest project intentionally classic, evoking memories of traditional war documentaries as opposed to modern online content new media formats.

For the documentarian, who has built a career exploring national heritage spanning various American subjects, the nation’s founding represents more than another topic but foundational. “As I mentioned to directing partner Sarah Botstein during our discussions, and she shared this view: no future work will carry greater importance,” Burns contemplates during a telephone interview.

Massive Research Effort

Burns, co-directors Botstein and David Schmidt and screenwriter Geoffrey Ward utilized numerous historical volumes and primary source materials. Dozens of historians, covering various ideological backgrounds, offered expert analysis together with prominent academics from a range of other fields including slavery, first nations scholarship and imperial studies.

Signature Documentary Style

The film’s approach will seem recognizable to fans of historical documentaries. The characteristic technique incorporated methodical photographic exploration across still photos, extensive employment of contemporary scores featuring talent reading diaries, letters and speeches.

Those projects established the filmmaker cemented his status; years later, presently the respected veteran of historical films, he seems able to recruit numerous talented actors. Participating with Burns at a recent event, the Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda observed: “A call from Ken Burns commands immediate acceptance.”

All-Star Cast

The lengthy creation process proved beneficial in terms of flexibility. Sessions happened at professional facilities, on location and remotely via Zoom, an approach adopted during the pandemic. The director describes collaborating with actor Josh Brolin, who made time while in Georgia to record his lines portraying the founding father before flying off to other professional obligations.

The cast includes numerous acclaimed actors, respected performing veterans, emerging and established stars, household names and rising talent, accomplished dramatic artists, Damian Lewis, Laura Linney, Tobias Menzies, skilled dramatic performers, television and film stars, plus additional notable names.

Burns emphasizes: “Frankly, this may be the best single cast recruited for any project. Their work is exceptional. Their celebrity status wasn’t the criteria. It irritated me when questioned, about the prominent cast. I explained, ‘These are artists.’ They represent global acting excellence and they animate historical material.”

Nuanced Narrative

However, the lack of surviving participants, photography and newsreels forced Burns and his team to depend substantially on historical documents, combining the first-person voices of numerous historical characters. This allowed them to show spectators not just the famous founders of the revolution plus numerous additional essential to the narrative, many of whom never even had a portrait painted.

Burns also indulged his particular enthusiasm for territorial understanding. “Maps fascinate me,” he notes, “with greater cartographic content in this project compared to previous works I’ve done combined.”

Worldwide Consequences

The team filmed at numerous significant sites across North America and in London to document environmental context and worked extensively with living history participants. These components unite to present a narrative more brutal, complicated and internationally important versus conventional understanding.

The film maintains, was no mere parochial quarrel concerning territory, taxes and political voice. Conversely, the project presents a violent confrontation that eventually involved multiple global powers and surprisingly represented termed “humanity’s highest ideals”.

Brother Against Brother

Initial complaints and protests aimed at the crown by American colonists across thirteen rebellious territories quickly evolved into a bloody domestic struggle, dividing communities and households and creating local enmities. In one segment, scholar Alan Taylor notes: “The primary misunderstanding concerning independence struggle is that it was something that unified Americans. It leaves out the reality that colonists battled fellow colonists.”

Historical Complexity

For him, the independence account that “for most of us suffers from excessive romance and idealization and lacks depth and fails to properly acknowledge the historical reality, and all the participants and the incredible violence of it.

Taylor maintains, a revolution that proclaimed the transformative concept of the unalienable rights of people; a vicious internal conflict, dividing revolutionaries and royalists; and a worldwide engagement, the fourth in a series of wars between imperial nations for the “prize of North America”.

Contingent Historical Events

Burns also wanted {to rediscover the