Victory by Ridicule

A stubborn idealist who was often destitute and at least once excommunicated, Miguel de Cervantes was in and out of jail as he worked on Spain's greatest classic, Don Quixote, published in 1605. Like his creator, Don Quixote was the object of ridicule. He charged giants that turned out to be windmills, fought armies that were flocks of sheep, worshiped the purity of a peasant wench who was gifted at salting pork. But in humanism's world of reason, Don Quixote's crime was not his madness but his faith. So is it in today's world of analytic couches. "It is my reason that laughs at my faith," wrote Spain's top Philosopher Miguel de Unamuno (1864-1936). "And it is here that I must betake me to my Lord Don Quixote in order that I may learn of him how to confront ridicule and overcome it." Don Quixote overcame it by letting the world overcome him. "The divine tragedy is the tragedy of the Cross," said Unamuno. "The human tragedy is the tragedy of Don Quixote."

In adapting Cervantes' work for last week's Du Pont Show of the Month (CBS), TV Writer Dale Wasserman caught the tragic essence of Don Quixote's comic role. In a tricky but effective device, he fused author and hero into one character, and let both proclaim: "To dream the impossible dream, to fight the unbeatable foe, and never to stop dreaming or fighting--this is man's privilege and the only life worth living." Viewers and critics inclined to snicker at such idealism missed the point of a fine TV drama whose central theme was man's eternal search for truth.

The roles of Cervantes and Don Quixote were played by Lee J. Cobb, 47, an excellent performer whose own search for truth has sometimes been confused. A would-be actor since his New York City College days, Cobb sold radios before he got into the old Group Theater, was on his way up, and starred memorably in Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman, before he was named in a congressional investigation as a former Communist. Cobb publicly denounced Communism, testified about other Red actors, and was given a meaty part in On the Waterfront by Elia Kazan, who had something of Cobb's history. Once again Lee Cobb was on top until a heart attack in 1955. Since then, he has regained his stature as Hollywood's No. 1 sin-ridden heavy. In I, Don Quixote, Actor Cobb, brilliantly backed by Eli Wallach and Colleen Dewhurst, put on a performance that was both poignant and terrifying but never out of control. His deeply felt Don Quixote seemed to overcome the world, as Philosopher Unamuno put it, "by giving [it] cause to laugh at him."

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