Ellen Burstyn, Joe Morton & More Set for the Public's All the President's Men?

Casting has been announced for the Public Theater's staged reading of All the President's Men? Ellen Burstyn will take on the role of Senator Elizabeth Warren, Joe Morton is set to play Senator Benjamin L. Cardin, Senator James M. Inhofe and Senator Patrick J. Leahy. Edited and directed by Nicolas Kent, the performance will take place at New York’s Town Hall on May 11 at 8:00pm.

Burstyn is a stage and screen veteran, having won Emmys in 2009 and 2013 for Law & Order: SVU and Political Animals, respectively, and an Oscar for Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore (she was also nominated five more times). Her numerous Broadway credits include Picnic, 84 Charing Cross Road, Shirley Valentine, Sacrilege and Same Time, Next Year (for which she won her Tony Award).

Morton is perhaps best known for his Emmy-winning work on screen as Rowan Pope, Kerry Washington’s evil father on Scandal. A Tony nominee for Raisin, his additional Broadway credits include Art, Honky Tonk Nights and Oh, Brother!.

The cast will also feature Staceyann Chin as Senator Mazie K. Hirono, David Costabile as Tom Price and Senator Chris Coons, Aasif Mandvi as Scott Pruitt and Senator Todd Young, Tony winner Denis O’Hare as Senator Orrin Hatch and Senator Lindsey Graham, New Yorker editor David Remnick as Al Franken and Ron Rifkin as Senator Bernard Sanders.

The evening is described as follows: In January, one week before the president’s inauguration a fierce fight erupted in the Senate between Republicans and Democrats over the confirmation of the key figures for President Trump’s cabinet. These four powerful men lead the Trump administration’s policy on Russia, the Middle East, Iran and North Korea, on human rights worldwide, on the Paris Climate control agreement, as well as on the civil rights and the health of millions of Americans. They are: Rex Tillerson, the former CEO of Exxon/Mobil, nominee for Secretary of State responsible for America’s foreign policy; Jeff Sessions, a leading campaigner for the President and now his chief law officer; Dr Tom Price, a strident critic of Obamacare and nominee for Health Secretary; and Scott Pruitt, a climate change sceptic nominated as Director of the Environmental Protection Agency.

In front of four separate Senate committees, the nominees were subjected to tough and relentless cross-examination. They were questioned forensically about their ethics, beliefs and political philosophies. Each of them had to fend off accusations ranging from corruption to deceit or racism. These gripping and dramatic verbatim Senate sessions probed their fitness for office, and give us insight into the future policies and direction of a Trump presidency.

As previously announced, the National Theatre presented a public staged reading of All the President's Men? on April 24 at the Vaudeville Theatre in the West End.