An indecorous peek at the personal life of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, “Hyde Park on Hudson” may tarnish the FDR image for some. While technically a drama, the film has a strong comedic tone and reveals both a human and humorous President.
It’s a widely known fact that FDR had a long-term love affair with Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd, Eleanor Roosevelt’s social secretary. However in “Hyde Park on Hudson,” screenwriter Richard Nelson brings to life a much more obscure tryst between President Roosevelt (played by Bill Murray) and his sixth cousin Margaret “Daisy” Suckley (pronounced “Sookley”).
In a script based on actual letters between Franklin and Daisy, screenwriter Nelson describes what inspired him to write about their liaison: “[the letters] described or conveyed a relationship that people just didn’t know about, a friendship, an intimate relationship between a forty-year old woman who excelled in her life and one of the most powerful men of the twentieth century.”
In a titillating scene, Daisy (Laura Linney) is summoned to meet the President. Waving off his Secret Service detail—“sometimes they have to catch a crook or something I suppose”—FDR takes Daisy for a break-neck drive in his hands-only driven car and manipulates her into pleasuring him in a manner so suggestive that it had Toronto audiences squirming in their seats.
Seen from Daisy’s perspective in voiceover narration, FDR hosts England’s King George VI and Queen Elizabeth for a weekend in 1939. Set in a time when the King was in desperate need of America’s help with an imminent war with Nazi Germany, the story becomes more about the Royal family and the Roosevelt’s awkwardness with each other’s customs than the secret affair.
FDR’s wife, mother and mistresses connive to plan the perfect royal visit. Franklin’s mother, anxious to not appear too common, declares “we will not serve the King of England cocktails.” Eleanor however decides to serve the British Royals a main course of hot dogs, the better to introduce the King and Queen to “real” American food.
Given Director Roger Michell’s (“Notting Hill”) comedic background, it’s no surprise that in a stroke of genius, he would cast Bill Murray as the only way to pull off the marriage of high society conventions with coarse culture. Murray’s dramatic capability and comedic depth, keep the film’s complex plot from becoming dry. With a look he conveys emotion, compassion and mirth. Off screen, Murray delivers no judgement on FDR’s extra marital exploits. Murray’s FDR is a human being with a sense of humor.
While “Hyde Park on Hudson” may turn the public persona of FDR on its ear, it’s the human aspect of FDR that may appeal to a wide audience. In one of the movie’s most touching scenes, Franklin is lifted by an aide and carried into the house. The most powerful man in the world is among the most vulnerable.
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“Hyde Park on Hudson” opens the 2012 Santa Fe Film Festival at 7:00 p.m on Thursday, December 6, at The Screen on the campus of the Santa Fe University of Art and Design.
For more information and complete program and schedule, please visit the Santa Fe Film Festival website. To purchase tickets, visit TicketsSantaFe.org.
