Ol’ Scratch

The alternate universe version of Dylan’s MacLeish story is detailed in Scott Ostrow’s “Present at the Creation, Leaping in the Dark, and Going Against the Grain.” Ostrow, who had produced the hit musical 1776, writes that he recruited Dylan and MacLeish in 1970 to collaborate on a musical adaptation of Stephen Vincent Benét’s “The Devil and Daniel Webster.” MacLeish biographer Scott Donaldson corroborates the story, although noting that MacLeish thought the idea “preposterous.” But, somehow Ostrow convinced both MacLeish and Dylan to give the collaboration a shot, with Dylan working from Ostrow’s Westchester County studio and MacLeish from his Conway, Massachusetts home.

According to Chronicles, the story begins two years earlier with Dylan returning from his father’s funeral to find a letter from “Archie” inviting him to discuss having Dylan compose some songs for a play MacLeish was writing.

“It was fitting I go see him,” Dylan writes, and goes on in the “New Morning” chapter to relate a late afternoon one-on-one conversation over tea where Dylan and MacLeish discuss subjects ranging from Ezra Pound to Robin Hood. By the end of day Dylan had decided “the dark apocalyptic” script MacLeish had shared with him ”wasn’t for me,” a strange judgement coming from the author of “A Hard Rain’s a-Gonna Fall,” but rather than saying so, Dylan tells MacLeish he’ll think about it.

Total b.s., according to Ostrow. His version has it that after several months of unproductive work, Dylan finally produced drafts of “Father of Night” and “New Morning” for the musical — now titled Scratch — and agreed to meet with Ostrow, MacLeish, and the show’s director at MacLeish’s home to see if it would further charge up his creative juices and help him finish the overdue score. Dylan brought along Al Kooper, who was introduced as Dylan’s “musical director.”

Rather than engaging Archibald MacLeish in literary conversation or discussing how his music could be used in Scratch, Dylan promptly fell asleep after drinking several snifters of MacLeish’s brandy, staying insensate until the group woke him when it was time to leave. Dylan mysteriously recovered his sobriety on the trip back to New York, inviting himself to dinner at Ostrow’s house, playing his classics to the family, and later singing a duet with Ostrow’s daughter, to the eleven-year-old’s delight.

In Chronicles, Dylan claims to have sent the completed acetates of “New Morning” to MacLeish, who replied with another invitation to visit him in Conway. On Dylan’s arrival, MacLeish questioned why the songs “weren’t darker” and offered advice to better connect the songs to Scratch’s characters.

“Deep down, I knew I couldn’t have anything to add to the message of his play,” Dylan writes. “He didn’t need my help anyway. He wanted only to talk about the play and that’s why I was here, but there was no hope and nothing to be done and soon that became obvious.”

According to Scott Ostrow, none of that is true — except perhaps Dylan’s “no hope, nothing to be done” inner monologue.

MacLeish wasn’t at his home in Conway, he was in Antigua, putting the final touches on Scratch; the sets were in design; the theatre was booked… all they were missing was Dylan’s score, and Dylan himself, who hadn’t been seen since his one and only visit to Conway. Ostrow decided on a desperate Plan B of using Dylan’s older songs, but still needed Dylan’s agreement. Instead, what Ostrow got was a call from Clive Davis, congratulating him on his role in Bob Dylan’s album, “New Morning,” which was to be released the next day.

Ostrow never heard from Dylan again. Against his better judgement, he produced Scratch as a non-musical play. It closed two days after opening.

“Now as to Bob Dylan. He proved to be simply incapable of producing new songs… Dylan has now entered advanced middle age, being almost thirty and no longer fiery: for another, [his old songs] are far better than anything he is now doing.” ~Archibald MacLeish

Archibald MacLeish was 79 years old at the time of that writing, and still fiery. Advanced middle age apparently takes some of us later rather than sooner.