You collect all this material and at a certain moment passages start speaking with other passages, ... A conversation that goes along with individual source material just takes off, and things start ricocheting and having surprising connections or counterbalances. You're always looking for yin and yang so the drama thrives on contrasts and contradictions. |
[He is particularly proud of the inclusion in this scene of a petition signed by 70 scientists asking Truman not to bomb Japan. Leslie Groves, the crusty general who oversaw the Manhattan Project, made sure that the document never reached Truman.] What's beautiful, ... is to have documents that were quietly discarded in history now set for singers and orchestra for all the world to hear. |
[The chorus contains a statement of the principles behind the bomb, why it's practical and what it can accomplish.] It doesn't exactly say how to build a nuclear weapon, ... but it is a précis of the science involved. |