'The American Revolution' The Metropolitan Museum of Art Share on Facebook Share on X Share to Flipboard Send an Email Show additional share options Share on LinkedIn Share on Pinterest Share on Reddit Share on Tumblr Share on Whats App Print the Article Post a Comment Logo text In mentioning Ken Burns' upcoming The American Revolution to casual observers, the most frequent response has been a variation on: "Wait. Hasn't he done that already?" The short answer is "No." The longer explanation is that Burns and his collaborators have hit the battlefield for documentaries about the Civil War, World War II and Vietnam, while our American origins have played a role in documentaries about Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, the adventures of Lewis and Clark, and the demise of the American buffalo - but that the American Revolution has not gotten the standalone Burns & Company treatment. Related Stories TV 'Brian and Maggie' Review: Steve Coogan and Harriet Walter Shine in PBS' Stephen Frears-Directed Drama About a Pivotal Margaret Thatcher Interview TV 'Reading Rainbow' Returns: Classic PBS Show Rebooted 20 Years After Final Episode The American Revolution The Bottom Line Rousing, if repetitive. Airdate: 8 p.m. Sunday, November 16 (PBS)Directors: Ken Burns, Sarah Botstein and David P. Schmidt It must be acknowledged, though, that if Ken Burns had already made a docuseries about the American Revolution, be it 45 years ago or one year ago, it would have been exactly like The American Revolution, which premieres the first of its six chapters on PBS on November 16. Though it's hard to watch The American Revolution without awareness of the anti-monarchic sentiments shared at recent rounds of "No Kings!" protests - to hear the noble egalitarian sentiments that launched the American experiment without pondering the ways the fulfillment of our freedoms has fallen short of our loftiest aspirations - the doc does not overtly acknowledge Donald Trump. It isn't fueled by the propulsive anger of The Vietnam War and The U.S. and the Holocaust, nor does it possess the hints of aesthetic experimentation exhibited by last year's Leonardo da Vinci. Directed by Burns, Sarah Botstein and David P. Schmidt, The American Revolution is smart, thorough, sincere in intent, and still of undeniable and uncomfortable importance with or without direct reference to the current political moment. At 12 hours, it's also dry and a little languid, relying on storytelling techniques - many reasonably fresh and vital back in 1990, when The Civil War planted Burns' flag as a key chronicler of our nation's history - that are treated with earnestness despite passing into the realm of parody long ago. Not strictly limiting itself to the war, The American Revolution stretches from 1754 to the ratification of the Constitution and then the Bill of Rights decades later, from the existence of a group of geographically proximate colonies with seemingly no shared interests to the establishment of a tenuous government that Franklin famously described as "A republic, if you can keep it." It connects the chronological dots from civil unrest to vigilante violence to a rag-tag military operation to a model for revolution that, over multiple centuries, leap-frogged around the world, all from a spark created by the likes of George Washington, Thomas Paine and a group of tea-disposing men in Indian costumes. The filmmakers touch on key battles, essential political and military figures and pivotal decisions made along the way, using a brigade of historians as primary sources for a target audience of bored kids eagerly awaiting the arrival of an AV cart and slightly older viewers whose primary point-of-entry for this period is the Hamilton soundtrack. That demographic, not insignificant, isn't directly pandered to and might wonder how Alexander Hamilton could be treated as a historical footnote. But they're still sure to relish context for previously mumbled references to Kips Bay, the code word being "Rochambeau" and how, exactly, General Charles Lee shat his bed at the battle of Monmouth. The directors and their selected ensemble of scholars - there is no single Shelby Foote-style centerpiece or breakout - are explicitly wary of Great Man interpretations of history. So even if George Washington has deserved pride of place as the documentary's "hero," various experts are practically giddy to highlight his myriad blunders and lucky escapes, as well as his unapologetic status as slaveowner and unscrupulous encroacher on Native lands, without denying him ample instances of genius. The documentary goes the other way as well, with Benedict Arnold receiving ample credit for his battlefield heroism and ample empathy for the adversity he faced over the years before eventually settling into his more familiar role as traitor. The doc is generally enamored of the internal conflicts and hypocrisies of the American Revolution, the celebrations of equality that excluded Blacks and N