O Poder Vai Dançar / Cradle Will Rock (1999)

Tim Robbins' Cradle Will Rock (1999) brought Blitzstein's opera back into popular
consciousness. The film is not an adaptation of the play. Robbins' panoramic
screenplay tells the story of Cradle's original production and opening night, weaving
it together with the larger story of the Federal Theatre Project, and the story of
Diego Rivera's Rockefeller Center mural (Man at the Crossroads Looking with Hope
and High Vision to the Choosing of a New and Better Future -- more on that here,
here, and here; also, read E.B. White's poem "I Paint What I See").

The graceful juggling of multiple narratives, and the dream ensemble cast, elicited comparisons with the films of Robert Altman. But this movie's clearest antecedent is E.L. Doctorow's Ragtime -- a kaleidoscopic social and political portrait of an era, in which fictional characters mingle with historical figures. Doctorow contributed a dust-jacket blurb to Robbins' published screenplay.