The Finales of Elia Kazan’s ‘A Face in the Crowd’ and the Trump Presidency
The climax of the 1957 film debut of Andy Griffith is eerily similar to the fall of Trump as the 45th American President
An endless amount of moments from A Face in the Crowd can be looked at as a link between the character of Lonesome Rhodes and the unfortunate truth of who former President Trump was/is. They both rose to fame in America through their popularity with a subset of American citizens. They both control almost any room they walk into based on their voice or attitude. And they both are incredible assholes to anyone who gets in their way.
What I’m more interested in looking at is how the finale of Kazan’s 1957 film almost predicted the way that Trump would leave the Oval Office and the public eye. But by no means does the story of Lonesome Rhodes mean that Trump is gone forever.
Lonesome rises to fame because of his song “Free Man in the Mornin’ and his comedic-singing role on a local Arkansas radio. He has that “Pinocchio-esque”, American-white-male aura of not having any strings on him. Nothing holds him back, not even his lies. He threatens to run away from his entertainment career a couple of times in the beginning of the film, but sticks around because of the money and fame he receives. Lonesome basically wants to do whatever he wants in the moment while not having to face any accountability. In the end, when he finally faces accountability for his idiotic mistake, he blames everyone else in his life besides Lonesome Rhodes, and already plans a “comeback”.
By the third act of A Face in the Crowd, Lonesome Rhodes was, possibly, the most influential person in America. He was wealthier than he ever believed was possible thanks to the advertisers and benefactors that poured their livelihoods into him. He had the most popular songs, TV programs, and products being dispersed across American wavelengths every day. His fascination with his “ratings” every night on his TV programs is both ironic and bittersweet when comparing him to Trump, since ratings are pretty much the basis for Trump’s psyche over the last few decades.
But Lonesome Rhodes acquired so much power and influence that he believed he could never be taken “down”, or to ever lose favor with the public. Former President Trump, for the majority of the 2020 election cycle, spouted election conspiracy theories just in case he lost (which is exactly what he did in 2016, too). When he lost, he dangerously kept amplifying the worst sides of American ideals in the 2020’s by not conceding and riling up his base to deny the democratic elections. He publicly made the case that it just wasn’t possible that he, Trump, lost. He couldn’t be taken down. Too many people loved him! And supported him!
Instead, he lit a stove-top grease fire, then ducked for cover in his final days of power. He eventually came to the conclusion that, yeah, he lost. He didn’t have the power that he throbbed for anymore. In his eyes, it seemed to be taken away in the *snap* of a finger.
Those final days of reclusiveness and pity — after igniting an insurrection on the Capitol, being impeached, and banned from Twitter — echoed the patheticness of Lonesome Rhodes’ final scene in A Face in the Crowd.
Lonesome was caught on his popular TV show “Cracker Barrel” speaking horribly about his fans straight into the camera as the credits rolled. He assumed the audio was off and went on a normal, chaotic Lonesome Rhodes comedy bit to make the extras laugh around him, but really showed America his true self. One of the disgusting remarks he makes about his American fans was, “They’re a lot of trained seals. I toss them a dead fish and they’ll flap their flippers.”
Once Lonesome is off the air he darts for the elevator so that he can head home for a big fundraising dinner. While he trots home he is unaware of what had just transpired on TV to millions of Americans. No one shows up to his dinner, fans call in outraged to the show, and his advertisers all pull out of supporting him and his product. Even his manager Joey is already on the phone with the suits about the “new” Lonesome Rhodes he has with him: a young southern folk-singer ready to fill the air space in American popular culture that Lonesome had just lost.
This, in an ironic way, resembles the dangerous actions done by Senators Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley to position themselves to receive the Trump base of voters for potential 2024 Presidential runs. We know watching A Face in the Crowd that Joey’s “new” Lonesome won’t be accepted like he once was. Just like we all know the Trump base only goes all in for Trump, and that they are not impressed with Senators Cruz or Hawley. Situations like these never seem to stop happening in America. Once something is a hit — like a certain SNL skit or type of movie franchise — the inorganic copycats are bred from a mixture of sweat, ignorance and despair for more. America loves beating a dead horse.
In the final scenes, when Lonesome is filled with his own sweat and despair, he cries for his remaining staff to “say you’re going to love me”. When they look at him in bewilderment and disgust, he spits out that he’s “surrounded by traitors” and orders them to leave. His self-destructive final moments in the film only echoes how we’ve seen Trump act as President for four years, and even more so in his final days.
Finally, Lonesome’s ex-business partner and ex-writer (played by Patricia Neal and Walter Mathau) arrive at his penthouse to tell him the truth about how his career ended earlier on TV. Lonesome is drunk and manic, screaming like a madman from the top of stairs about his power with the people. Andy Griffith’s booming yawps as Lonesome in this scene scream out all the true loneliness and despair that the character of Mr. Rhodes felt. He manically says that he’ll have all his power back, shouting, “Because the people listen to Lonesome Rhodes. Because the people love Lonesome Rhodes. Lonesome Rhodes is the people. The people is Lonesome Rhodes.” This mixture of delusion and power grips into the heart of Lonesome in the same way Trump feels at his horrifying rallies. In those moments, they see their followings as an infinite extension of themselves, imagining that their power over the minds of Americans will never cease.
Once Lonesome flips back to sadness, he cries. Then he lifts his head up and sings aloud the song that made him famous, almost as if he recites the lyrics that sparked the beginnings of his fame, that it then would transport him back to his innocence as a radio musician and comedian in Arkansas, fixing all the problems he’s caused.
Lonesome then locks eyes with Marcia, (Patricia Neal) the woman who made him who he is. Unbeknownst to him, she was the person in the sound studio who let the nation hear Lonesome’s true self instead of the usual credits. He begs her to help him get all of his power back, but steps back and is shocked when she finally tells him that it was her who caused his downfall. Matthau begins to walk Patricia out, but Lonesome screams once more, “Listen I’m not through yet. You know what’s going to happen to me?!”
Matthau’s character, Mel, having had enough of Lonesome Rhodes, quips back at him with brutal honesty:
“Suppose I tell you exactly what’s gonna happen to you. You’re gonna be back in television. Only it won’t be quite the same as it was before. There’ll be a reasonable cooling-off period and then somebody will say: “Why don’t we try him again in a inexpensive format. People’s memories aren’t too long.” And you know, in a way, he’ll be right. Some of the people will forget, and some of them won’t. Oh, you’ll have a show. Maybe not the best hour or, you know, top 10. Maybe not even in the top 35. But you’ll have a show. It just won’t be quite the same as it was before. Then a couple of new fellas will come along. And pretty soon, a lot of your fans will be flocking around them. And then one day, somebody’ll ask: “Whatever happened to, a, whatshisname? You know, the one who was so big. The number-one fella a couple of years ago. He was famous. How can we forget a name like that? Oh by the way, have you seen, a, Barry Mills? I think he’s the greatest thing since Will Rogers.”
The story of Lonesome Rhodes ends with him realizing that Mathau is right: he’ll come back to the spotlight in some form, it just won’t ever be the same.
Mel was also right about another thing: people’s memories here in America aren’t too long. Soon enough (as if it isn’t already happening right now) Trump’s base of supporters will try to rise him up again in some kind of format in the public eye of America. Maybe he’ll have a TV channel. Or maybe one day he’ll be able to post on social media again. At the least, he’ll go on the road for more Trump rallies to raise money for himself and feed his crowds of adorers. In some way and form, Donald Trump will be back. We’re stuck with him just like how we’re stuck with all that he’s done to America over the last six years.
Now personally, growing up in a lively and diverse section of America, I was taught that we are a melting pot of cultures and ethnicities. It’s a comfortable ideal, one that hopes multiculturalism can thrive everywhere in America like we’re all part of Spiderman’s friendly neighborhood. It took elementary school history — specifically being forced to dress up as a Native American and “whooping” at a holiday recital, or learning about the slaves who were whipped and forced to work years ago on the same land that I learned spelling on — to show me that this melting pot is actually a boiling pot filled with grease. And it’s on a gas stove. And as I got older, the pot got hotter; the innards of the pot rising as time slipped by. This is what it felt like to grow up in the 2000’s and 2010’s, and then begin adulthood as Donald Trump rose to power in America.
I specifically remember sitting in one of my community college lectures in January of 2017 — my last semester there before taking a break and then transferring to CNU — on the morning of Trump’s inauguration. I got news notifications during a boring part of the biology lecture: they all were notifying me that Donald Trump finally had just been inaugurated as the 45th President. Four years later I received my B.A. in English (with a Film Studies minor!) in the December that Trump stoked division and spread falsehoods about the election after spending four years in the White House…stoking division and spreading falsehoods.
Something felt different this time, though. It felt like something that was both good and bad at the same time. The future didn’t seem as dim as a few years ago. Hindsight helps, but so does having the will to see the better parts of America instead of just focusing on the worse.
In the end, A Face in the Crowd is an American movie telling an American story. Elia Kazan showed us that some things will never change here, for better or for worse. This country is sticky. There will always be darkness stuck to us. It is simply up to us to choose how to respond to that darkness now, in the present, so that we can brighten the lights for the future.
