from pacifica, this is democracy now! to introducece myself, i belongo a special tribe of what used to be calllled troubadours.. sometimes they were called minstrels. now we're e called songwriters. we work for, in our songs, a sort of a better world, a rainbow world. now my generation, unfortunately, never succeeded in creating that rainbow world, so we can't hand it down to you. but we could hand down our songs,

which still hang on to hope and laughter. today wewe pay tribute to the blalacklisted lyricist yip p harburg, the man whwho put the rainbow in the wizard d of oz, a democracy now! special. all that and more, coming up. welcome to democracy now!,!, demomocracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. and those are some of the headlines this is democracy now, democracynow.org, the war and peace repoport. i'm amy goodman. amy goodman: today, we pay tribute to yip harburg. his name may not be familiar to many, but t his songs are sung by millions around the world, like jazz singer a abbey lincoln

and tom waits, judy collins, and dr. john from new orleans, peter yarrow, that's al jolson, and our beloved odetta.

"brother, can you spare a dime?" may well be a new anthem for many americans. the lyrics to that classic american song were written by yip harburg. he was blacklisted during the mccarthy era. during his career as a lyricist, yip harburg used his words to express anti-racist, pro-worker messages. he's best known for writing the lyrics to the wizard of oz, but he also had two hits on broadway: bloomer girls, about the women's suffrage movement, and finian's rainbow, a kind of immigrants' anthem about race and class and so much else. today, in this democracy now! special, we pay tribute to yip harburg's life. ernie harburg is yip's son and biographer. he co-wrote the book who put the rainbow in the wizard of oz?: yip harburg, lyricist.

i met up with ernie harburg at the new york public library for performing arts at lincoln center years ago when they are exhibiting yip harburg's work. ernie harburg took me on a tour. ernie harburg: the f first place is business about words, and one of them is t that the songs, when they were wriritten back in those days, anyhow, always h had a lyricicit ana cocomposer, and neither one of them wrwrote the song. they both wrote the song. however, in the englglish languagege, you know, you have "this is gershwin's song," or "this is" - they usually say the composerer's song. i've r rarely everer heard somebody say,, "this is yip h harburg's song" or " "ira gershwin's sonong." both of them w would be wrong. the fact i is, two people writete a song. so i i'm going to lk a about yiyip's lyrics and then lyrics in t sonong. now the e first thing we're looking at here isis an expression realllly of p's s phosopophy and bacackgrou, icich he bringngs to writing lyrics foror the songs.

and whwhat it says heree is that songs have always been man's anodyne against tyranny and terror. the artist is on the side of humanity from the time that he was born a hundred yearars ago in the dire depths o of poverty that only the lower east side in manhattan could have when the russian jews, about two million of them, got up out of the russian's shadows and ghettos, and the courageous ones came over here and settled in that area of what we now know as the east village. and yip knew povoverty deeply, and he quoted bernard shaw as saying that the chill of poverty never leaves your bones. and it was the basis of yip's understanding of life as struggle.

amy goodman: let's go back to how yip got his start. ernie harburg: yip was, at a very early age, interested in poetry, and he used to go to the tompkins square library to read, and the librarians just fed him these things. and he got hooked on every one of the english poets, and especially o. henry, the ending. he always has a little great ending on the e end of each of his songs.. and d he got h hooked on w.s. gilbert, the b bab ballads. and then, when he went to townsend high school, they had them sitting in the seats by alphabetical order, so yip was "h" and gershwin was "g", so ira sat next to yip. one day, yip walked in with the bab ballads, and ira, who was very shy and hardly spoke with anybody, just suddenly lit up and said, "do you like those?"

and they got into a conversation, and ira then said, "do you know there's music to that?" anand yip said, "no.o." he said, "well, come on home." so they went to ira'a's home, which was on 2nd avenue and 5th street which h is sorort of upper from yip's poverty at 11th and c. and they had a victrola, which is like having, you know, huge instruments today, and played him h.m.s. pinafore. well, yip was just absolutely flabbergasted, knocked out. and that did it. i mean, for the both of them, because ira was intensely interested that thing, too.

that began their lifelong friendship. then ira went on to be one of the pioneers, with 25 other guys, jewish russian immigrants, who developed the american musical theater. and it was only after - in 1924, i think, that ira's first show with george gershwin, his brother, that they started writing together. amy goodman: the gershwins' porgy and bess in 1940.

ernie harburg: yip's career took a kind of detour, because when the war, world war i,i, came and yip was a socialist and did not believe in the war, he tooook a boat down to ururugy for three years. i mean, he refused to fight in the thing.g. that's shades of 1968 and the vietnam war, right? amy goodman: and why didn't he belilieve in world war i? ernie harburg: because he was a full, deep-dyed socialist who did not belilieve that capitalisism

was the answer to the human community and that indeed it was the destruction of the human spirit. and he would not fight its wars. and at that time, the socialists and the lefties, as they were called, bolsheviks and everything else, were against the war. and so, when he came back, he got married, he had two kids, and he went into the electrical appliance business, and all l the time hanging out with ira and g george and howard dietz and buddy de s sylva and writing light t verse fofor the f.f.p.a conning towe. and the newspapers used d to cay light t verse, every newspspape. there were about twenty-five of them at that time, not two or three n now owned d by two people in t the world, you know. and they actualllly carried light veverse. well, yip anand ira and dororothy parkerer, the whole crowd, had light verse in there, and, you know, they loved it. so, when the crash came and yip's business went under,

and he was abobout anywherere from $50,0,000 to $70,000 inin , his partnener went bankrupt. hehe didn't. he repaid the loans for the next 20 or 15 years, at least. ira and he agreed that he shohould start writing lylyr. amy goodman: let's talk about what yip is most knownwn for: finian's rainbow, the wizard of oz. right here, what do we have in front of us? ernie harburg: we have a lead sheet. we are in the gallerery of the lincoln center for the performing arts, and there's an exhibition called "the necessity of rainbows," which is the work of yip harburg. and we are looking at the lead sheet of "brother, can you spare a dime?" which came from a review called americana, which-it was the first review, which was-had a political theme to it: at that time, the notion of the forgotten man.

you have to remember what the great depression was all about. it's hard to imagine that now. but when roosevelt said, "one-third of the nation are ill-clclothed, ill-housed and ill-fed," that's exactly what it was.. ththere was atat least 30 percet unemploymement at those timeme. and among blacks a and minoriti, it was 50, 6 60 percent. and there were breadlines and- now, the rich, you know, kept living their lifestyle, but broadway was reduced to about 12 musicals a year from prior, in the '20s, about 50 a year, ok? so it bebecame harder. but the great depression was deep down a fact of life in everybody's mind. and all the songs were censored-i use that loosely-by the music publishers. they only wanted love songs or escape songs,

so that in 1929 you had "happy days are here again," and you had all of these kinds of songs. there wasn't one song that addressed the depression, in which we were all living. and this show, the americana show, yip was asked to write a song or get the lyrics up for a song which addressed itself to the breadlines, ok? and so, he, at that time, was working very closely with jay gorney. jay had a tune, which he had brought over with him when he was eight years old from russia, and it was in a minor key, which is a whole different key. most popular songs are in major. and it was a russian lullaby, and it was da, da, da,

da, da, da, da, da, da.. and jay had - somebody else had lyrics for it: "once i knewew a big blonde, and she had big blue e eyes. shshe was big blue" - like that. and it was a torch song, ofof which we talkeded about. and yip said, "well, could we throw the words out, and i'i'll take the tunene?" alright. and if you look at yip's notes, which are in the book that i mentioned, you'll see he started out writing a very satiric comedic song. at that time, rockefeller, the ancient one, wawas going around viving out dimeses to peopople, and hehe had a--yipp had a satiric thing about "can i share m my dime with you" you know? but then, right t in the middld, other imimages started cocoming out in his writings, and you had a man in a mill, and the whole thing turnrned ino the e song that t we know it no, which is here and which i can read to you. and if you do this song, you have to do the verse,

because that's where a lot of the action is. amy goodman: can you sing it to me? ernie harburg: alright, i'll try. it won't be as good as bing crosby or tom waits. [singing] they used to tell me i i was buildiding a dreream, and soso follolowed the momob, when there was earth to plow or gununs to beaear, i was s always thehere right t on the j job. they usesed to telell me i wawas buildiding a dreamam, with pea andnd glory a ahead, why should b be stanng in liline, just wtiting for b bread?

yip haurg:g: [singining] oncece i built a railroaoad i made it run, made it race against time. once i built a railroad; now itit's done. buddy,y, can you spare a dime? amy goododman: yip harburgrg singing g in 1975. yip harburg: [sisinging] ononce i built a tower to the sunun, brick k and rivet and lime;; once i built t that tower; now it's done. brbrother, can you spare a dime? amy goodman: when was ththis sog first t played? ernie harburg: in 1932. and in the americana review,

every critic, everybody took it up, and it swept the nation. in fact, paradoxically, i think roroosevelt and the e democratic party really wanted to tone it down and keep it off the radio, because playing havoc with trying to not talk about the depression, which everybody did. you remember the hoover thing, not only "happy days are here again," but "two chickens in every pot," and so forth. nobody wanted to sing about the depression either, you know. amy goodman: yet, yip harburg was a supporter of fdr. ernie harburg: y yes. but polits are polilitics, you know, and the thing was that,, in facact, historically, t this, i would say, the only song thatat addressed itself seriouslsly to the great depression, the condition of our lives, which nobody wanted to talk about and nobody wanted to sing about. amy goodman: ernie harburg, son of yipip harburg.

when we come back from our break, we'l'll talk abouthehe wizard of oz,z, finian's raininbow and other shows. [break]

amy goodman: we

continue with our democracy now! special, on our journey of yip harburg's life with his son, ernie harburg. ernie talks about how yip harburg wrote the lyrics to the wizard of oz. ernie harburg: actually, yip did more than the lyrics. when they were-when yip and harold arlen were called in to do the score of the wizard of oz, it was yip who had this executive experience in h his electrical appliance e business and also had b become a shshow doctor, so he was-that is, when a show wasn't working, you would call somebody and try to fix it up.

he had an overview of shows and he had an executive talent. and so, he was always what they called a "muscle man" in a show, alright? and he'd already worked with bert lahr in a great song, "the woodchopper's song,and-d- amy gogoodman: wait a second. bertrt lahr, the lion?n? ernihaharburg:he l lion. bert lahahr and stst of t these people were from vaudeville and burlesesque. and yip knew them in the '20s, but he actually worked with bert lahr in this light - walk a little faster and another review. i forget that name, but he and-yip and arlenn gave bert songs to sing, which allowed him to satirize the opera world, if youou want, or a send-off of rich, y you kn. and so, they had that relationship. alsoso, yip knew jack haley, the tin woodman.

and yip also worked with bobby connolly as a choreographer in the early '30s on his shows, who was also the choreographer for the wizard of oz. so he had a cast here with arlen who were, you know, sort of yip's men. you know what i mean? so, when yip went to arthur freed, the producer, who was too busy to work on this musical, and mervin leroy had nothing to do with it, practically, because he had never done a musical before, so it became a vacuum in which the lyricist entered, because he was all ready to do so. yip was always an active, you know, organizer. and so, , the first thing he suggested was that they integrate the music with the story, which at that time in hollywood they usually didn't do. they'd stop the story, and you'd sing a song. they'd stop the story and sing a song. that you i integrate this-arthur freed accepted the idea immediately. yip then wrote-yip and harold then wrote the songs for the 45 minutes within a 110-minute film.

the munchkin sequence and into the emerald city and on their way to the wicked witch, when all the songs stopped, because they wouldn't let them do anymore. ok? you'll notice then the chase begins, you see, in the movie. amy goodman: why wouldn't they let them do anymore? ernie harburg: because they didn't understand what he was doing, and they wanted a chase in there. so, anyhow, yip also wrote all the dialogue in that time and the setup to the songs, and he also wrote the part where they give out the heart, the brains and the nerve, because he was the final script editor. and there was eleven screenwriters on t that. and he pulledd the whwhole thing togegether, wrote hihis own lines and gave the thing a coherence and a unity, ich made it a a work of art. but he doesn't get credit for that. he gets "lyryrics by e.y. haharburg," you see? but, nevertheless, he put his influence on the thing.

amy goodman: who wrote the wizard of oz originally, the story? ernie harburg: yeah, frank l. baum was an interesting kind of maverick guy, who at one point in his life was an editor of a paper in south dakota. and this was at the time of the populist revolutions or revolts, or whatever you want to call it, in the midwest, because the e railroadads and the eastern cityty banks absolutely dominated the life of the farmers, and they couldn't get away from the debts that were accumulated from these. and baum set out consciously to create an american fable so that the american k kids dididn't have to read those german gririmm fairy storories, where theyey chopped off hands and things likike that. you know, he dididn't like that. he wanted an a american fable. but it had this ununderlay of political symbobolism to it that the f farmer-the scarececrw was s the farmer.

he thought he was dumb, but he really wasn't;; he had a brain. and the e tin woodman was the result-was the laborer in the factories. wiwith one accident afteter ano, he was totally reduced to a tin m man with no heart, alright, on an assembly line. and the cowardly lion was william jennings bryan, who kept tryrying-was a big politician at that time, promising to make ththe world over with the ld s standard, you know? and the wizard, who was a humbug type, was the wall street finances, and the wicked witch was probably the railroads, but i'm not t sure. alright? so it was a beautiful match-up here with frank baum and d yip harbu, ok, bebecause in t the book,

the woword "rainbow" was never once mentioned. and you can go back and look at it. i did three times. the woword "rainbow" is nevever once mentioned in the book. and the book opens up wiwith dorothy on a blalack-and-whihite world, that kanansas had nono color. just read the fifirst paragraph h in it. so, whenen they got to the parat where they had to get the songng for the little girl, they hadn't written it yet. they had written everything else. they hadn't written the song for judydy garland, who was a a discovery byby one of yiyis collababorato, burton lanane. and d nobody knew the wondnder in hereroice at t that time.e. so they woworked on ththis son, and at thahat time, ira, yip, larry hart and the others thought that the composer should create the music first. now, they were both locked into-the lyricist

and the composer were locked into the storyline and the character and ththe plot development.. so they both knew thatat at this p point there was a little girl in trouble on the k kansas city environmnment, alright, anand that she yearned to get out of trouble, alright? so yip g gave roldld whwhat they call a "dummy tle."" it's not the final title, but it's something that more or less zeroes in on what the situation is all about and what-this little girl is going to take a journey, alright? so yip gave him a title: "i want to get on the other side of the rainbow." yip harburg: now, here's what happened, and i want you to play this symphonically!

ok, i said, "my god, harold! this is a 12-year-old girl wanting to be somewhere over the rainbow. it isn't nelson eddy!" and i got frightened, and i said, "i don't-let's save it. let's save it for something else. but don't-let's not have it in." well, he felt-he was crestfallen, as he should be. and i said, "let's try again." well, he tried for another week, tried all kinds of things, but he kept coming back to it, as he should have. and he came back, and i was worried about it, and i called ira gershwin over, my friend. ira said to him, he said, "can you play it a little more in a pop style?" and i played it, with rhythm. ok, i said, "oh, well, that's great. that's fine."

i said, "now we have to get a title for it." i didn't know what the title was going to be. and when he had [sings] dee-da-dee-da-da-da-da, [talking] i finally came to the thing, the way our logic lies in it, "i want to be somewhere on the other side of the rainbow." and i began trying to fit it: "on the other side of the rainbow." when he had a front phrase like daa-da-da-da-da - now, if you say "eee," you couldn't sing "eee-ee." you had to sing "ooooh." that's the only thing that would get a-and i had to get something with "oh" in it, see: "over the rain" - now, that sings beautifully, see. so the sound forced me into the word "over," which was much better than "on the other side." judy garland: [singing] somewhere over the rainbow way up high,

there's a a land that t i heardf oncece in a lullaby.y. ernie harburg: anyhow, yip-arlen worked on it. he came up with this incredible music, which, if anybody wants to try it, justst play the chordsds alone, not the melody, and you will hear pachelbel, and yoyou will hear religious hymns, and you will hear fairy tales and lullabies, just in the chords. no one ever listens to that, but try it, if you play the piano. and at any rate, on top of these chords,

then harold ststarted the thing off with an n octave jump: "somewhere" " - ok, and yip had no idea what to do with that octave jump. incidedentally, haharold did ths inin per moooon, too, if youou remember. let's see how did that start? yip harburg: [singing] it's onlnly a paper moon sailing over a cardboard s sea but t it wouldn't bebe make-bele if you believed in mee ernie e harburg: and harold was a great composer. so yip wrerestled wiwith it for r about ththree weeks,

and finally he camame up with t the word. yoyou see, thihis is what a l lyricisist does: ththe word, toto hit thehe stor, the chcharacter,r, the music.. itit's an inincredible thing.. "s"some-where." alrighght, and then when you putut in an octave, you geget "some-where," okok, and you jump up, a and yoe ready to take e that journey. alright? where?? "o-ver t the rainbow." ok? ? and then you're e off! it's not a lovove song. it's s story of a little girirl that w wants to get out. she's in troublele, and shshe wants to get somewewh. wewell, the rainbow w was the oy color that she'd'd see in kansn. she wants to get over the rainbow. but then, yip puput in sometethg whicich makes it a yip sonong. hehe said,d, "and the dreams you dare to dream really d do come true." yoyou see? andnd that wordrd "dare" l lands on ththe note, and it's a p perfect thing, and d it's been generatingng coe

for peopople for years afterwaw, you know? judy garland: [singing] somewhere over the rainbow skies are blue, and the dreams ttt you dare to dream really do o come true.e. erninie harburg: that's ththe wy ththat the whole score c came. amy goodman: was it a hit right away? ernie harburg: no, it wasn't. this was supposed to be an answer, mgm's answer to snow white and the seven dwarves, and of about 10 major critics at that time when the wizard of oz came out, i would say only two liked the show. ththe other eieight said it w was corny, , that it wawas, that judy garland was no good, and so forth. oh, yeah. you could read again in the book, who put t the rainbow on the wizizard of oz?z?, by harold d meyerson and d ernie harburg.

but it persisted, , you know? and thenen, in 1956,6, when t televisioion first started saturating the n natio-- amy goodman: morore than 20 yeas later.r. ernie harburg: more than 20 years later. i don't think they even had their money back from the show, see? mgm m sold the f film rightsts , who then p put it on.. and it hit the topop of t the-it brokeke out every single record there was, and d it's been playing every year since then. and, of course, it went around the w world, and it's become a major artwork, which is, must say,, an american artwork, becacause the story, the p plot with the threeee characterers, the brain, the heart, thehe courage,, and finding a home is a universal story for everybody. and that's an americanan kind of f a story, alright?

and yip and harold put these things into song. amy goododman: who did the munchkinins represent? munchkins: [singing] we represent the l lollipop gugd the lollipop guild, the lollipop guild. and in the name of the lollipop guild... erernie harburg: oh, you mean political thing? i think they represent the little people, you know, the people. and that's they way they were-it came on in the book. you see, the book, if you're a purist, you wouldn't like the film. it's just like anything else. there are societies of people who meet and discuss the books. ok, there's even a society for the winkies, which are the guards around the wicked witch's, you know, castle. there really is! they meet once a year. and they're seserious! they don't like the pipicture, because it didn't follow the book, see, becauseip and the write chanangeit, asasollywoodod wl.

amgoodmama was the book a ttle bit re favorle t to e winknks? nie harbg: no-well, ye the nkies we good pele, and ey were ayed up ere. ifif y go back d read the book, you wilsee th they we a lovel dent kininof peopl yes. that wasne thingi guess wasasn'pc thehe, you know? but, nevertheles when y read a od novov, and you e the fi, thers hardlyny relatnship tween thtwo. all theslinenes om the fm ha entered thamericananguage in wayay tt peopop don't even owow whe thehey me froro you ow, , "g, tototolooks like we're t t in ksas s anore."" or, yoyoknow, "come out, come o, , wherer you a," which in the '70s started taking on, when the gay movement started, this line started meanining different things, you see? glinda: [singing] ] come out, come out, wherever you are and meet the young lady, who fell from a star.

erernie harbururg: so o the sos keep grorowing with h the time. people i interpret them, you k ? amy goododman: how d did yip fel in the late 1950s, when it was a hit, when people started hearing it all over the world? ernie harbg:g: well, i t think they were quite surprised, along with the film moguls, you know, and the fact that-years and years later, he and harold both said that they did not know what depth and strength that that song "over the rainbow" had. and also, one other one, the song "ding! dong! the witch is dead" is a universal liberation, a freedom, cry for freedom, you know, which isn't seen like that, but it-one time, when some tyrannical owner of an airlines company stepped down, all the employees started singing "ding! dong! the witch is dead."

so people use these words. anand during t the war, worlrld war ii,, "we're off to see the wizard" was sung by troops marching, you know? but nobodydy knows that yip wrote the words,s, you see. now, harold wrwrote the music, anand the songs were yip and harold. that's it. amy y goodman: thihis is democry nonow!, democracynow.orgrg, the war r and pepeace report. if you'd like a copypy of today's's show, you can n go to our websbsite at democracynow.org. back in a minute. [break]

amy goodman: we continue on our tour through the life of lyricist yip harburg with his son ernie harburg.

erernie harburg: we're walking through the gallery here at the lincoln centeter for r the perfororming artrts, which hass "the n necessityty of rainbows dedicated to the works of yipip harburg, , the lyriric. and we're now looking at the various exhibitions. and whilile we're lolooking for fininian's rainbnbow, i want to tell you that in 1944, yip conceived and co-wrote the script and put on a show called bloomer girl, which was way ahead of its time, because bloomer girl was dolly bloomer, who was an actual suffragette in 1860 who stood up and invented pants. and it was radicical in tse d days. and the show was about dolly bloomer, and she ran an underground railroad, bringing slaves up, and she had an underground paper, and she was an incredible woman. and this was a political show. some great songs in there.

maureen mcgovern does "right as the rain" in a great way. lena horne does "eagle and me," which was the first song on broadway that wasn't a blues lamentation about the black-white situation. it was a call to action. "we gotta be free, the eagle and me." ok? and dooley wilson, who was in casablanca, sang that. so, agagain, yip managed to o gt his philosopophy into o his sho, which was the second truly integrated american musical after oklahoma. and while, you know, it hasn't been played around, it's still marked that historically. after that came finian's rainbow. amy goodman: you mean blacks and whites playing in the cast.

ernie harburg: no, not in there. in finian's rainbow, i mean that it was a political statement. bloomer girl was a political statement, and it was a smash h hit. in 1946, yip conceived the idea, the story,y, the e script for r finian's rainbow, which h was meant to b be an anti-i-racist and, in a cecertain sesense, anti-capitalist showow also. amy y goodman: let's find itit. erernie haururg: alright, let's s go. amy goodman: letet's find finian's raiainbow. erninie harburg: h here's cabin in the sky, which h is the first all-black hollywood film in the '40s, which yip and harold did also. "happiness is just a a thing calalled joe." here's bloomemer girl that i'm talking about. so, we should be, somehow, coming onto finian's rainbow. but here's yip here. there's a video of yip talking, if you want to meet the man.

interviewer: you got into political trouble in this country at a time when a lot of people got into political trouble, during the mccarthy years. were you blacklisted? yip harburg: thank god, yes. interviewer: during that mccarthy period, were they actually going through your lyrics with a fine-toothed comb looking for lines that might be subversive, that might show yip harburg's true political colors? yip harburg: yes. i wrote a song for cabin in the sky, which ethel waters sang and was part of the situation in the picture. here was a poor woman who had nothing in life except this one man, joe, and she sang, "it seemed like happiness is just a thing called joe." one of t the produducers, with not a macroscope, but a microscope, found in this lyric that "happiness is just a thing called joe" was a tribute to joe stalin.

we're kidding about it now, but the country, this was the blackest, the blackest and darkest moment in the history of this beautiful country.

ernie harburg: now, here we are at finian's rainbow at last.t. and this was-yip conceived this in 1946. and fred saidy, who was his co-script wrwriter-and d harold a arlen demumurred from writing this,, becaususe he felt that yip was too fervenent in his political opinions, and he wanted-harold wanted to do something else. so yip got burt lane and then came out with this great, great score from finian's rainbow, "old devil moon." "how are things in glocca morra?" etc. but the theme of finian's was a total fantasy,

and it was an american fable in which an irishman and d his daughter come from ireld, s search arouod and find rainbowow valley in "missititucky." ok? and he believes s that if he e plantsts the crockck of, which h he stole from the leprecechaun, in the g grou, thatat it will grow, just like at fort t knox, righg? the whole e thing wawas fabulou! and then,

the southern white senator, a very stereotypic part, finds out t that finiaian has this land and tries to runun him out of town,

because ththere's blacks and whites living togetherer, and, you know, they're sharecroppers. and they claim that finian's daughter is a witch, and d they're going to burn her at the stake, and all sort ofof increble ththings that s say something about the amicican sce. but the score was s so great that peoplple who see it d do not see it as a socialist tract, which the only onenen broadwayay they see it as a verery, very entertaining musical and ununique in american musica, because, in the first place, there are very, very few musicals which are original. most musicals are adapted fromooooks, and this was just conceived by fred saidy and yias a satirir sendoff on american society.

so, you've got this great sonong in herere, "when the idle poor become thehe idle ririch," w are you u going to knonow who is who or who o is which? ok, yoknow, like that. and so, finian's rainbow has become a classic.

now, it's ininteresting that finian's s has not had a tour, a national tour, since 1948. but they play it in every single high school in the united states, three or four times s a month in every state of the union.n. so, finian's's was, at the time, 191947, when the colold war wabeginning and the house unun-american committetee s stararting up, and d they were sesearching for lefties.s. and d 1951, yipip had been blacklisted fromom any chancnce to do any of the wonderful shows that they did in hollywood, dr. doolittle, treasure island. he was blocked from working there. and then he was blocked from going into radio and into tv. so-anand this i is an historical fact which yip himsmself says--broadway

and the american theater in new york city was the only place where an artist could stand up and say whatever he wanted, provided he got the money to put the show on. so, for finian's rainbow, they had to have 25 auditions, because they said it was a commie e red thing. anand finay, ey got the moneyp, and they put the show up. but by that time, yip was blacklisted. and his next show was jamaica with lena horne, with an all-black cast. one other thing, in terms of yip's drive for race or ethnic equality, anand that is thatat finian'sainbnbow in 1947 was the e first shshow onon broadway where the chorus l line consisted of blacks and whes whwho danced with h each other, and the chororus was an intntegrated affafair.

amy goodman: what hahappened to him m during the m mccarthera? ernie harbrburg: welell, he coud not wo on n any major r film ththathey wanted h him to workn from the majoror studios inin hollywowood. the setutup was that roy brerew, whwho was ththe head o of thiate unioion-i'i'm sorry toto say that-was s the one whwho- amy y goodman:n: what do y you ? erninie harbururg: well, i i mn this is a stagehehds' ununion. i'likeke to sayy gogood things s abouunions, but t they get burucraratized, and th g go right-wiwing, yoyou know?? ththey get b bad. this w a bad l leader, and he terrorirized all of t the jewismoguls who wewere beingng accused of commumunism by the house un-american activities committee, and they yielded to whatever he said to them, out of fear that they would get branded as communists

or that they'd boycott the filmlm, alright? and so, when, you know, they called yip in to do huckleberry finn with burt lane, then roy and the guys said, "no, he's on our blacklist, ok? and you can't hire him." and then yip went away. and they wanted him to work on dr. doolittttle. "no, you can't hire him." and the same thing for radio and tv. and that was known as a, quote, "blacklist," which wasn't - that wasn't the first use of the term, because in small towns we had company corporations going, ifif you did s something thatat the compapany didn't lik, you werere blacklisted from tot. you coululdn't get a job in tot. but this was the first time, due to the technology, that a blacklist was national and accompanied by a loaded word, "communist,"," that could get you fired ananyplace. for yip, it was horrible, because his friends, who were artists, suddenly hadad no incocome.

and erere we suiuicides. there was divovorces. therwere people whwho left t the country.. therere were p people whose lives were jusust ruined. and so, yiyip supported some of ththem. daltonon trumbo, who o was one of the hollylywod ten who werere first picked out by the house un-american activities committee to go to jail for a year, a citation. "are you n now or haveve y everer been a membmber of the communist party you knowow, yip fronted him with moneyey, and so forth. it was a h horrible time. amy y goodman: how long couldn't yip work for? ernie haharburg: foror aboutut from 195951 to 1962. he c came back to holwood in 196262, when he and harold arlen did gay paris, which is with judy garland. she asked them to come back. and it's a cult animated cartoon now, which you can get in your video. and i remember him putting on a show at the taber auditorium.

"welcome back, yip," you know? and he-in '62. amy goodman: but that means that the wizard of oz made it big during the time that he was blacklisted. that was-and when you consider the social commentary that it was making, that's pretty profound. ernie harburg: yeah, but i don't think hardly anyone knows the political symbolism underneath the wizard of oz, because, again, it's a thing that happens in finian's rainbow, even though as peter stone, a noted playwright on broadway, said, "it's the only socialist tract ever on broadway." alright? people don't hear the political message in it, ok? they are vastly entertained. the same thing happens with the wizard. you know, nobody would even think of such a thing. yip harburg: my songs, like "when the idle poor become the idle rich" and "brother, can you spare a dime?" caused a great deal of furor during a period in hollywood when a fellow by the name of joe mccarthy was reigning susupreme.

and so, they got something up for people to take care of us, like me, called the e blacklist. and landed o on the enememy lis. and in order to overcome the enemy list -- what was the enemy list? well, it's, one, that you were a red; another one, thatat you were a bluenose; and the e other one,e, that you're onon the blacklist. finally,y, i thought the rainbow was a a wonderful symbol of all these lists.. in order to overercome the eny lilist and this rainbow that they gave me the idea for, i wrote this little poem: lives of great men all remind us greatness takes no easy way, all the heroes of tomorrow are the heretics of today.

socrates and galileo, john brown, thoreau, christ and debs heard the night cry "down with traitors!" and the dawn s shout "up the rebs!" nothing ever seems to bust them - gallows, crosses, prison bars; tho' we try to readjust them there they are among the stars. lives of great men all remind us we can write our names on high and departing leave behind us thumbprints in the f fbi. amy goodman: today's program was actually produced for radio in 1996 with errol maitland and dan coughlin. special thanks to gary helm, brother shine and julie

drizen.

us again here soon on "bento expo." maki, shall we dig in? >> yeah. hello. glad to have you with us on nhk "newsline." i'm miki yamamoto. we start in tokyo where a nissan motor executive is out on bail and defending him saying he wants to restore his damaged reputation. greg kelly was a close aide to the company's former chairman, carlos ghosn, who's still being detained.