Director Ron Maxwell, actors Stephen Lang and Tom Berenger, and a dozen other cast members and crew joined hundreds of starstruck history and movie buffs this weekend to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the 1993 release of the film “Gettysburg.”
The celebrations occurred across the county at the Adams County Historical Society (ACHS), the Seminary Ridge Museum, the Majestic Theater, and other sites.
Speaking to a crowd at ACHS, Maxwell said the film wasn’t a solitary effort: “It was a collection of filmmakers that willed it into being.”
Lang, who played Major Gen. George Pickett, recalled reading Michael Shaara’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book “The Killer Angels” around 1976, shortly after its 1974 release. The film was adapted from the book.
Years later, while he was playing Hamlet, he heard that the man who was going to direct “Killer Angels” was in the audience. “I had it in mind I had to play Pickett,” said Lang.
After the play, the director introduced himself, saying “Hi, I’m Ron Maxwell.” Lang replied, saying “Hi, I’m George Pickett.”
“Ron sort of looked at me and said, ‘I think we should have breakfast tomorrow,’ and by the end of breakfast I had the part,” said Lang. “It’s very unusual that you wind up playing a part you’ve dreamed of for years. It was a real privilege.”
Lang wasn’t the only person who long dreamed of doing the movie. Maxwell also read the book shortly after it came out, immediately obtained the movie rights, and “talked about Killer Angels on the set of every movie I worked on for the next 10 years.” But Maxwell said getting the green light from a studio at times appeared more like “Mission Impossible” than “Killer Angels.”
Berenger, who played Lieutenant General James Longstreet, shared memories of traveling around the country on family vacations, including a first trip to Gettysburg at age 7.
Like every other seven-year-old boy who ever visited Gettysburg, Berenger said his best memory was scrambling around Devil’s Den. “And when the time came to film Pickett’s Charge, I was suddenly a seven-year-old in Devil’s Den again,” he said.
Maxwell, on the other hand, said he had never toured any Civil War battlefield until his first visit to meet with Shaara. “On the first day, he showed me the first-day scenes he wrote about and we did the same the next two days,” he said. “It started a great friendship that lasted until he died in 1988. So he never got to see his book brought to the screen.”
Each of the actors reflected on the timelessness and the lasting historical impact of the movie. Berenger said the best-known aspect of his role was the long-running disagreement between his character and General Lee about Longstreet’s suggestion the army move around the Army of the Potomac’s flank. Upon reflection, Berenger said, he concluded that Longstreet may have been wrong. “You get the corps in marching order, they’re strung out along Emmitsburg Pike, and they’re presenting their flank to Meade’s army.”
Maxwell said the film was “an open-ended partnership between the dead, the living, and the unborn. The film has entered a timeless place. It provides a window into the moral universe of the generation that lived the catastrophe of the Civil War.”
Lang also complimented ACHS Executive Director Andrew Dalton and the entire team. “When I heard they were working on this, my reaction was, do we need another museum in Gettysburg?”
“This museum? Yes we do,” he said.
Other actors in attendance included Brian Mallon (Maj. Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock), Patrick Gorman (Maj. Gen. John Bell Hood), James Lancaster (Lt. Col. Arthur Fremantle), Joseph Fuqua (Maj. Gen JEB Stuart), John Rothman (Maj. Gen. John Reynolds), Bo Brinkman (Walter Taylor), and Maxwell Caulfield (Col. Strong Vincent).
The weekend-long program included one-on-one meet-and-greet sessions with each actor, multiple screenings of the film, and discussions by the Union and Confederates actors about the broader themes of the movie.
Leon Reed, freelance reporter, is a former US Senate staff member, defense consultant, and history teacher. He is a 10 year resident of Gettysburg, where he writes military history and explores the park and the Adams County countryside. He is the publisher at Little Falls Books, chaired the Adams County 2020 Census Complete Count Committee and is on the board of SCCAP. He and his wife, Lois, have 3 children, 3 cats, and 5 grandchildren.
“Like Tom Berenger, I loved to scramble around the Devil’s Den while on a family vacation in 1964, which continued to Washington D.C. and the World’s Fair in New York City. I actually met Berenger when he was at college at Christian College (now Columbia College in Columbia, Missouri) through a mutual friend, Ted Dugan. The movie was excellent, an A+ for Civil War buffs.
Stephen, me too (Devil’s Den). My first visit was two days short of my 8th birthday and my main memory, like Berenger’s, is scrambling around Devil’s Den.
I first watched Gettysburg in Australia when it came out and was already interested in the American Civil War with North and South some years earlier.
A fantastic movie with great performances that further provoked my interest and this led to a visit to the US in 2009 with a three day excursion to the Gettysburg battlefield.
I’m also privileged to own a Tom Berenger signed 150th Gettysburg commemoration DVD.
I’m sorry I couldn’t make it to the 30th anniversary activities due to the tyranny of distance.