Yes, I am quoting Capt. Reynolds today.
“It's my estimation that every man ever got a statue made of him was one kind of a son of a bitch or another." --Malcolm Reynolds.
The quote is full relevant to today's topic.
I really love the musical 'The Greatest Showman'. So many of those songs speak to me and the overall story is great. I get emotional just about every time I watch, which is a lot because I enjoy having it on in the background when I write. The song 'A Million Dreams' is myself and my mindset to a scary level and 'This Is Me' very much fits with what I have gone through in my life.
I also know the truth, that the story is highly, and I mean highly, romanticized account of the life of P.T. Barnum. There is really little fact or truth to be found in musical. There was a great deal of 'questionable' actions taken by the real Barnum. He very much exploited people for his own gain, openly drawing people to his shows with admitted hoaxes that he justified.
I am fully able to separate the real Barnum from the romanticized image from 'The Greatest Showman' and just enjoy the show for the meaningful entertainment that it is.
Yet I keep running across various reviews of the show that are all based on the real Barnum and being upset over him being romanticized on any level. They refuse to separate the two versions and claim it is insulting to do so.
And that takes us back to the Malcom Reynalds quote.
We romanticize so many historic characters, like the Founding Fathers, and are able to look the other way over their failings. So why is it that every so often a historic figure is not allowed to be romanticized at all? With obvious exceptions like Hitler, so many of our historic figures are easy to romanticize and turn into something greater than they were. I know whenever I see Winston Churchill being highly praised it bothers me, for while he did some great things in his time, he was a racist and held some interesting beliefs regarding imperialism. Yet I am able to enjoy the fiction that uses his character, even knowing they are romanticizing the person. It is like how everyone ignores that JFK slept around, even while being praised as a great family man.
These are men with statures to them who are one kind of a son of a bitch or another, and history is full of such people.
Looking at any period pieces with real historic figures in them, those characters will be romanticized concepts to fit with the desired story, no matter how close to reality they try to get. It is part of being human to embellish upon the stories we tell. In the case of 'The Greatest Showman' there is no doubt they fully knew they were romanticizing his life for the sake of the story.
Being aware of the accurate history should not take away from the enjoyment of a good story that is clearly not supposed to be accurate. Knowing the truth about Barnum will never take away from the joy and meaning I get from watching 'The Greatest Showman'. That is a big advantage to being able to separate fact from the fiction and understand the difference between the two.
