“Thomas More Waits in the Tower of London”

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One of my favorite Al Stewart songs is 1978’s “A Man for All Seasons,” from his album Time Passages. While I love the song, I had never seen the movie from which it took its name (the 1966 Oscar-winning Best Picture) until 2007. One night it was on Turner Classic Movies, at about 2 AM. I was riveted. Two hours later I was amazed. I had found a new great classic film to fall in love with. How I can remember the movie is beyond me. About five hours after the film ended on TV my life got turned upside down when my mom suffered a brain aneurysm. But the movie did stay with me. A week ago I found Charlton Heston’s performance, made for television, on You Tube, so I watched it. Heston’s performance as Sir Thomas More, a devout Catholic who refused to acknowledge his friend, King Henry VIII, as “supreme head of the church in England” and was beheaded for high treason, was marvelous. In fact, if I hadn’t seen the film I would say it was outstanding. But there was something about Paul Scofield’s work (which won him the Best Actor Academy Award in 1966) as More that was absolutely fantastic. Just as Heston so brilliantly portrayed Moses in The Ten Commandments that you almost expect Moses to look like Heston, Scofield owned the character he played, to the point where you wonder why the statues at churches named for More (he was canonized in the early 20th century as a martyr) don’t resemble Scofield! Al Stewart is known for his “historical narrative” songs (he even joked about his songs being “history books set to music” when I saw him in concert a few years ago). On Time Passages he based a look at religious beliefs (Stewart identifies himself as an agnostic) around the story of Sir Thomas More. If you aren’t aware of it, More was friends with Henry VIII. When the king wanted to marry his brother’s widow he got a “special dispensation” from the Pope to do so. After a few years of no male heir (this was the 16th century, remember, when a male offspring was a sign of masculinity, much like the line in The Godfather where Luka prays that “their first child be a masculine child” in his greeting to Vito), Henry decided the problem was his queen, so he decided he was going to get rid of her in favor of his mistress (Anne Boleyn). Of course, that would require another ruling from the pope, which wasn’t likely. Henry’s solution was relatively simple: he declared himself the sovereign of all of Great Britain, which included the church in England. He granted himself a divorce and married Anne Boleyn. Thomas More, a lawyer by trade and chancellor by appointment, vehemently believed that the king — nor any “temporal” government — had not the power to overrule almighty God’s laws. However, he didn’t say that, stating that the law would protect him as he had never SPOKEN against the king. The movie lays this all out, including some scheming by Sir Thomas Cromwell (who, ironically, would later be beheaded as well for high treason [in a nasty way....the executioner wasn’t a good aim or the blade was dull, or....hopefully you get the picture]), where More ends up in the Tower of London, awaiting trial and subsequently execution. This is but a small part of the Al Stewart song, basically confined to the second verse (“Thomas More waits in the Tower of London, watching the sand running out and measures the hours out from here to oblivion in actions that can’t be undone”). During other parts of the song he questions if others would be so steadfast in their beliefs (‘what if you reached the age of reason, only to find there was no reprieve? Would you still be a man for all seasons, or would you just disbelieve?”). The great song brought me to a great movie. One of the things I love so much about music. The Al Stewart song: