With Porchlight Music Theatre presenting “The Teapot Scandals of 1923,” a world premiere musical comedy, we ask: What was the original, historical Teapot Scandal?
Named for Wyoming’s Teapot Dome, a teapot-shaped rock formation and the site of a government-controlled oil reserve, the scandal notoriously blackened the reputation of U.S. President Warren Harding (in office 1921 to 1923) and his administration.
In exchange for about $400,000 in bribes from two oil executives, then-Interior Secretary Albert Fall leased the Naval oil reserves at Teapot Dome and at another site in California. The leases were legal at the time (even though Fall granted them with no competitive bidding). But the money changing hands? Not so much.
The Wall Street Journal broke the story on Fall’s secret arrangement (and suspiciously luxe lifestyle) and the U.S. Senate opened an investigation in 1922.
Civil and criminal suits followed, and in 1929 the court sent Fall to prison, the first presidential cabinet member to sit behind bars for falling down on the job.
“It was the most nakedly manipulative thing that people did in the Harding administration for self-aggrandizement,” says Steve Scott, an associate producer at the Goodman Theatre, who directs the Porchlight production.
And perfect fodder for a vaudeville-style show on the indiscretions of the president’s henchmen.
“All of the scandals were so absurd and in some ways so juvenile,” Scott adds. “It’s like a bunch of little kids screwing everyone over to get everyone’s lunch money.”
In a clever stroke, the show explains the Teapot Dome scandal by way of barbershop quartet–consisting of Secretary Fall, profiting oil tycoon Harry Sinclair, Secretary of the Navy Edwin Denby and shadowy government aide Jess Smith.
Porchlight Music Theatre’s “The Teapot Scandals of 1923” is in previews. It opens Feb. 4 and runs through March 10 at Theatre Building Chicago, 1225 W. Belmont Ave. Tickets are $18-$20; call 773-327-5252 or 312-559-1212, ticketmaster.com
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