Jean P. Bordewich

Jean P. Bordewich draws on a lifetime of experience in and around politics for her plays, which take the audience behind the scenes of dramatic political events, including key historical moments, and infuses the stories with contemporary meaning.

She is currently writing a play about the most controversial election in US history and what it means today. Two of her full-length plays, “HUNT,” and "Marriage, Lizards and Love," were produced in the Washington, DC Fringe Festival, where HUNT received a "Best of the Fringe" award. HUNT also has received two public readings in Washington, DC, and one in San Francisco. Her latest full-length play, "Now's the Time," is about Reconstruction and the fight over racial equality and political power. It has received public readings in Washington, DC...

Jean P. Bordewich draws on a lifetime of experience in and around politics for her plays, which take the audience behind the scenes of dramatic political events, including key historical moments, and infuses the stories with contemporary meaning.

She is currently writing a play about the most controversial election in US history and what it means today. Two of her full-length plays, “HUNT,” and "Marriage, Lizards and Love," were produced in the Washington, DC Fringe Festival, where HUNT received a "Best of the Fringe" award. HUNT also has received two public readings in Washington, DC, and one in San Francisco. Her latest full-length play, "Now's the Time," is about Reconstruction and the fight over racial equality and political power. It has received public readings in Washington, DC and Lancaster, PA, and has been adapted for educational use. In 2021, she was commissioned to write two short plays about "bridging divides" for a reading series at Creative Cauldron Theater in Falls Church, VA.

Jean previously worked as a program officer at the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation in Menlo Park, CA, managing a portfolio of grants related to strengthening U.S. democracy. Earlier, she served more than five years as staff director of the U.S. Senate Committee on Rules and Administration and staff director of the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies, which was responsible for all events at the U.S. Capitol for the 2013 Inauguration of President Obama. She has run Congressional campaigns, including her own unsuccessful House bid, been chief of staff to a Congressman, and was elected three times to the council in her Hudson Valley home town.

Jean can be reached at jeanbordewich@gmail.com. She lives with her husband, historian and writer Fergus M. Bordewich, in Washington, DC.

Scripts

Now's the Time

by Jean P. Bordewich

Cast Size

6—7

Genre

biography,

docudrama/historic,

drama,

period,

political,

tragedy,

young audiences

Now’s The Time opens at the dawn of Reconstruction (1865). The Civil War has just ended but the nation is plunged again into crisis with the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln. Andrew Johnson ascends to the Presidency determined to restore white supremacy in the South. Congressional radicals led by Thaddeus Stevens are fighting for a different vision. They intend to create a new society of full racial...

Now’s The Time opens at the dawn of Reconstruction (1865). The Civil War has just ended but the nation is plunged again into crisis with the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln. Andrew Johnson ascends to the Presidency determined to restore white supremacy in the South. Congressional radicals led by Thaddeus Stevens are fighting for a different vision. They intend to create a new society of full racial equality, where Black Americans will have real economic and political power, including ownership of land confiscated from the rebels, education, suffrage and election to public office. This titanic political battle between President and Congress culminates in the first impeachment and trial of a U.S. president, and to more than 150 years of continuing violence and discrimination against Black Americans.

HUNT: A Political Drama

by Jean P. Bordewich

1

Cast Size

9—11

Genre

biography,

docudrama/historic,

drama,

political,

tragedy

HUNT is a drama based on the true story of Senator Lester Hunt in the early 1950s, with themes that are all-too-relevant today. HUNT raises enduring questions such as: How do demagogues feed on our politics? What moral values are we willing to bend and when? How does conscience struggle against treachery and power? What must we sacrifice for others?

During the McCarthy-era political environment of fear, red...

HUNT is a drama based on the true story of Senator Lester Hunt in the early 1950s, with themes that are all-too-relevant today. HUNT raises enduring questions such as: How do demagogues feed on our politics? What moral values are we willing to bend and when? How does conscience struggle against treachery and power? What must we sacrifice for others?

During the McCarthy-era political environment of fear, red-baiting, campaigns against gays in government, and imminent court decisions over school desegregation, allies of Senator Joe McCarthy blackmailed Hunt after the arrest of Hunt’s son for soliciting homosexual acts. Hunt, a New Deal Democrat from Wyoming who opposed McCarthy, was an ideal target for the Republicans, who were desperate to bolster their shrinking majority in the Senate by any means. Should he resign, Wyoming’s Republican governor would replace him with a Republican. Hunt struggled for a year against the forces that steadily marched against him using his son as leverage. On June 19, 1954, facing new threats, he shot himself to death in his Senate office.

Some of the characters, such as Lyndon Johnson and Roy Cohn, are familiar to theater audiences. Others, such as Senators Styles Bridges, Herman Welker, and Estes Kefauver, may not be. This story of power, blackmail and tragedy at the highest levels of government is a cautionary tale for any time, but it speaks particularly to the current political moment and the 2020 elections.