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theater people to come who can perform on a union basis, not to sing or do anything, but to do union kind of thing?”
He says, “We're hiring somebody to handle it.”
I found out that they hired an agent who is pro-union and also a left guy, whom I knew. He called me and he said to me, “They told me to call you.” Because that time we had already done “Take Care.” They wanted to know if it's possible to do “Take Care.”
“Really, that doesn't lend itself. It can't be. I'd love to do it. It would be the greatest thing, but it would be bad. For that kind of thing, you need folksingers.
He says, “I have a problem.”
I say, “What's your problem?”
He says, “Every time I bring up a name, they shoot it down.”
“Why?”
“You know why. They don't want Pete Seeger. They don't want this guy and that guy.”
By the end they got so frustrated by it that they said, “To heck with it. If you can get Pete Seeger, get Pete Seeger.” They got Ossie to emcee.
Ossie called me and I said, “Okay. Do it.” But that's the kind of thing that would go on.
So that the anti-communism of the labor movement--
At the top it interfered. It interfered also in the sense that -- when we come to Bread and Roses, I'll tell you about an interesting meeting I had with Tom Donahue on just this thing. Since we're on the point, I'll make it. By that time, Bread and Roses was well-known, and Jack Golodner, who was in the department of professional employees, who was very, very close to me on Bread and Roses and was very helpful, the professional employees, you know, all the actors, all the unions, see, in the performing arts. Jack was getting a grant from the Endowment. The concept was to do a show, to take a labor type exhibition aboard. He had the ins on the grants to do it. He even called Nina Felshin, whom he knew, because Nina had been the curator at the George Meany Study Center, and asked her if she would curate the show, and she said she would. “Let's figure out what it's to be.” And he arranged a meeting in Washington. He asked me to come to meet
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