By Keith Uhlich
Words make order out of chaos, and so it follows that the tenuous bonds holding the town of Deadwood together are maintained, in part, by the work of newspaperman A.W. Merrick.
Merrick is a seemingly tireless optimist who looks every bit the buffoon. It's no accident he's brought to life by the great character actor Jeffrey Jones, who has certainly suffered his share of indignities both actual and fictional (who else could claim being the perpetual punchline of both Ferris Bueller and Mozart?). Both actor and character are perversely appropriate additions to Deadwood creator 
David Milch's damaged-goods rogues gallery, though Jones' transformation into the roly-poly, mustachioed Merrick (who, on cue, sheds sweat like some characters shed tears) is almost too much to absorb at first sight. The way in which Merrick moves tentatively forward in his introductory scene - pursuing Wild Bill Hickok (Keith Carradine) in the series pilot episode like the most timid and inept of paparazzi - blurs the line separating fiction from non-fiction. It treads cruel exploitation, but as the series progresses it becomes increasingly clear that Merrick is the secular soul of Deadwood.
In a community steeped in blasphemy and obscenity, Merrick remains an eternally wide-eyed innocent, even when forced to compromise his gifts. Such compromise rarely makes a dent in Merrick’s character - where the upper-crust widow Alma Garret (Molly Parker) can only speak in Victorian allusions, Merrick has enough of a self-made social standing (not to mention the correct member between his legs) to commit his pontifications to newsprint. The Deadwood Pioneer is the town's living Bible -- a document that both records history and shapes behavior, reflecting society back on itself. Merrick's commitment to the printed word makes him a holy man of sorts, though one doubts he'd ever be put through as many trials by fire (whether at the hand of man or deity) as the Reverends Smith (Raymond McKinnon) and Cramed (Zach Grenier). At least the Reverends can proclaim, with some measure of certainty, that God is on their side. Wordsmiths, whatever their religious affiliations, are grounded in everyday grunt work, finding beauty and truth in the here and now while just as often acknowledging, even wallowing, in life's unpleasantness.
Merrick is good at hiding his insecurities, cloaking them in bemused private jokes (as when he stifles a bourgeois snort while explaining the redundancy of writing "free gratis"), anxiously delving into the toys of his trade (see his giggly and protective behavior when unpacking a new flash camera) or suggesting, without a shred of irony, that Deadwood has need of a walking club ("The Ambulators!"). He's largely blind to the literal and figurative shit surrounding him -- a child let loose in the harsh world that paranoid parents are always warning their offspring about. Yet Merrick's naiveté is the very quality that ensures his continued survival. Indeed, he never quite realizes how much danger he's in, but this is why he can face down some of Deadwood's more hot-tempered residents like Steve the drunk (Michael Harney) and, with the help of his simultaneously intimidating and intoxicating vocabulary, live to tell the tale.
He can be gotten to, of course, as we all can. The quintessential Merrick scene occurs at the beginning of the second-season episode "E.B. Was Left Out", where Al Swearengen (Ian McShane) discovers -- apropos of the not-so-subtle interconnections linking the press with big business -- that the buildings housing the Gem Saloon and the Deadwood Pioneer are joined by a hidden doorway. Al comes upon Merrick, as the latter describes himself, in a state of "despair," sitting amidst the remains of his printing press, which has been destroyed and shat on by hooligans. His grief is palpable, though near-completely self-centered (his expressions of concern for the new schoolteacher, who ran off upon seeing the remains of Merrick's office, come off as the whinings of an adolescent who's lost his new plaything). Swearengen immediately recognizes Merrick's babblings as a motherlode of excusatory bullshit. He whacks the newsman across the face, then launches into one of the show's finest soliloquies: "Pain, or damage, don't end the world. Or despair. Or fuckin' beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man - and give some back." Merrick's face is ecstatic: the wordsmith has just had an inspirational, potentially life-long mantra laid out before him and he moves forward, from this point, with a renewed sense of purpose (never mind that Swearengen's actions are not now, nor ever, entirely selfless). 
As Deadwood has acquired more and more of civilization's trappings, Merrick has come increasingly to the fore, finding a kindred spirit in Blazanov (Pavel Lychnikoff), the Russian telegraph operator who watches over his decoded missives like a Knight Templar guarding the Holy Grail. From an ideological standpoint, Blazanov is the person Merrick aspires to be. At the same time Merrick seems to recognize, more so than Blazanov, the necessity of compromise, even if one doubts he'd ever come out and explicitly say so. No, the Merrick more readily on display is the one who, in an upcoming third season episode of Deadwood, acts as host of a political debate and opens his remarks by quoting, before a hilariously disinterested audience, from Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America: "When an opinion has taken root in a democracy and established itself in the mind of the majority it thereafter persists by itself."
Whatever the obstacles before him, whatever the compromises to which he must accede, Merrick nonetheless believes in the power of words and ideas to effect change in the populace-at-large, even if the results he desires are rarely seen right away. To this end, Merrick's subsequent riposte to de Tocqueville stands as the wordsmith's credo: "Tonight let us plant the seed of an opinion to take root and grow deep..."
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Tuesday, June 06, 2006
Deadweek: The wordsmith's credo; a portrait of A.W. Merrick
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9 comments:
One thing that always intrigues me about Merrick is the question of whether he's fully aware of how willingly he cooperates in the creation and maintainence of a status quo in "Deadwood." The Season Two curtain raiser Ep. 13 and 14, "A Lie Agreed Upon Parts 1 & 2" draws this out in a pair of scenes near the end, when Merrick and Swearengen discuss how best to chronicle the events of this dramatic day, specifically the fight beween Swearengen in Bullock, which ended in an uneasy truce. Merrick announces his intent to clean up the reality, to present ". . . the facts rendered fully, within social standards and sensibilities, without bias or abridgement." That line contains a couple of phrases at odds with each other, "without bias or abridgement" and "within social standards and sensibilities." In other words, all the news that's fit to print; the legend, not necessarily the nasty fact. This ties in with your point about Merrick colluding with the powers that be -- Milch's acknowledgment that journalism, as typically practiced in this country, is often no more than steongraphy in the service of power, and that no censorship is necessary when the press, for all sorts of self-interested reasons, routinely censors itself. If memory serves, Merrick repeats a version of his "all the news fit to print" sentiment in one of the forthcoming Season Three episodes.
Swearengen mocks this impulse by verbally ghostwriting a draft of Merrick's history of that day. "Tonight throughout Deadwood," Swearengen dictates to Merrick, "heads may be laid to pillows, assuaged and reassured, for that purveyor for profit of everything sordid and vicious, Al Swearengen, already beaten to a fare-thee-well earlier in the day by sheriff Bullock, has returned to the sheriff the implements and ornaments of his office. Without the tawdry walls of the saloon The Gem, decent citizens may pursue with a new and jaunty freedom all aspects of Christian commerce. . . ." Later, in solitude, Swearengen adds more information, better representing the reality of life in Deadwood. "A full fair-mindedness also requires us to report that within The Gem, on Deadwood's main thoroughfare, comely whores, decently priced liquor and the squarest games of chance in the hills remain unabatedly available at all hours, seven days a week." The official version of history butts up against the reality throughout this series -- note the scene in Ep. 12 where Peter Coyote's cavalryman regales a crowd with an account of military heroism liberally salted with patriotic bromides, while out in the crowd, an obviously war-scarred, probably demented serviceman blurts out correctives to everything he says.
You point out towards the end of your piece, "Whatever the obstacles before him, whatever the compromises to which he must accede, Merrick nonetheless believes in the power of words and ideas to effect change in the populace-at-large, even if the results he desires are rarely seen right away." I'd agree with that -- Merrick is certainly one of the show's most optimistic, pro-social, life affirming and constructive characters. But he collaborates with power so eagerly, and censors himself so willingly, that I sometimes wonder if he's not doing both good and harm -- if, while helping Deadwood take a step forward, his methods unwittingly make it take at least a half-step back.
Yeah, I'm right behind Matt on this one. Merrick, for all his apparent education and self-consciously ornate language, is clearly enforcing the status quo throughout the series. For all his conviviality and attempts to foster a spirit of comradery with those he views as worthy of his time (such as Seth, Sol and Charley) in the end, his paper is up for hire and he bends his will to the most powerful bidder, in a metaphorical sense.
Is Merrick really that calculating and compliant? He certainly refused to allow his newpaper to be used by Commisioner Jarry, and he flared in anger even after Tolliver laboriously made clear that he had ordered the vandalization of the printing press in retaliation. Now he eventually compromised his free press ideals to further Swearengen's "Montana interest" ruse, but did he do so simply as a man bending to the powers that be? Surely its more that he was enthralled and seduced by Al's "give some back" speech. Nobody making a cynical accomodation would have been so proud of the extra elaborations he worked into the Montana lie (interest from Wyoming, etc.) or so childishly angry when Al berates him over gilding the lily. Merrick's ideals may be contradictory ("all the facts...within social standards") and he may repeatedly fail to uphold them, but they are all he has.
He can't give them up and fall into any kind of pure lackey stance without compromising his basic sense of self. (I think. Season 3 may prove me wrong.)
Merrick is not mercenary. When he bends, its for a cause. He resisted letting his paper be the organ of the Hearst (through Tolliver)machine. He purposefully chose a side (Al, the Sheriff).
I don't think Merrick is cynical at all. He really believes he is doing the right thing. But he's clearly under Al's thumb, no matter how hard he works to rationalize his choices.
David Milch really deserves a huge round applause for both hiring Jones and sticking with him...his legal difficulties are the sort of thing that, 99.9% of the time, keep actors from ever working again. I really can't imagine anyone playing Merrick better, and without him the show would be a little less deserving of being called the show with the coolest cast in TV history (I continue to be blown away when I stop and think about how amazing it is that Powers Boothe, Jones, Willam Sanderson, Brad Dourif, Ian McShane and now Brian Fricking Cox are all on a series together!).
Yeah, this show often seems like the result of a mythical federal law: the A-list Character Actors' Full Employment Act of 2003.
I've always wondered if Milch has any experience in journalism that would have given him insight into the production of a small town newspaper (I can't see anything on his resume that I know of that would show this to be true). Merrick is so accurate to that type of person, that occupation, etc., that I think he almost has to.
The Deadwood Pioneer still exists, though it consolidated with many other newspapers some years ago and is now the Black Hills Pioneer (published in Spearfish, I believe).
Matt raises the question of Merrick's complicity in the creation and maintainence of the status quo. Dan supports Matt's suspicion that Merrick is something of a running dog. Keith counters this by highlighting the essential innocence of Merrick with respect to power. If he serves certain interests, he does so unwittingly. Dan is down with this and Kevbo points out that Merrick is loyal to the existing community and has so far resisted absorption by the heavy money coming to town.
I think all the commentators are correct depending on whether Merrick is interpreted concretely as a character or abstractly as representative of an institution. In pursuing this distiction, I propose we return to the point of departure Keith chose; i.e., words. For whenever Merrick speaks, he speaks as both an individual citizen and as the voice of The Fifth Estate.
As a concrete character, it seems to me that Merrick is about as pure as new snow. Keith mentioned that just before he learns that his press has been ransacked, Merrick is flirting with the newly arrived school teacher. This is a tease, a false lead the writers set up to fool us into thinking for a moment that Merrick is a man like any other in Deadwood, with the same erotic needs. This false lead is revealed as such the second Merrick learns of the vandalism. His personal passion is his vocation, in fact, he could care less about getting laid. The character is essentially asexual, (although Keith is quite correct that his professional position is gender ascribed.) In short, he is childlike.
I think the key indicator of this is his utter abstinence when it comes to profanity. This is not a trivial difference in Deadwood, fuck no. That cocksucker never swears. To be sure, this reflects his own notion of himself as a man of letters, his pretentioins to being cultured. I take this to be secondary, however, to the signal that the guy is as innocent and nonthreatening as a child. And the words he uses - actually, the ones he doesn't use - are how we know this.
But what about the words he does use, all the big, fancy ones which Merrick displays like a peacock its feathers? Contrary to his own opinion of himself, Merrick is not an intellectual devoted to a mandate nor a pedagoge for the people. He is a wordsmith operating on behalf of those that advertise with him, are literate enough to assess his copy and powerful enough to influence him editorially. Viewed abstractly as the representation of institutionalised public discourse, as The Press, Merrick is - not "for sale", not corrupt - but rather for-Sale, devoted to making Deadwood safe and stable for business. If his newspaper is not a blatent media organ of established interests, it is already objectively compelled in that direction.
It remains to be seen if Merrick himself will have the entrepreneurial acumen to hitch his media wagon to the winning economic horses. Keith is right that the definitive scene for Merrick is when Swearengen slaps him around and tells him to get with the program. Ironically for Al, this could entail Merrick ultimately going with Hearst. Either way, as the voice of the emergent polity that is Deadwood, Merrick is already in the pocket of wealth and power. The words he speaks are bon-bons, sweet on the outside but with a hard core. The candy-coating on the is all journalistic neutrality and idealism. The crunchy center is servitude to those who own property and command the labour of those who do not.
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