All the King's Men

All the King's Men is a novel by Robert Penn Warren, published in 1946. The novel won the Pulitzer Prize in 1947 and is acknowledged to be one of the best American political novels of all time. It portrays the life of an ambitious, unscrupulous and populist politician Willie Stark as told by Jack Burden, who works for Willie. There is a striking similarity between Stark and the real-life politico Huey P. Long. The novel is important not only for its fascinating depiction of the rise and corruption of Stark, however, but also for the portrayal of the cynical Burden.

The title comes from the English nursery rhyme, "Humpty Dumpty".

All the King's Men is also a film based on Warren's novel. Released in 1949, the film won Oscars that year for

• Best Picture - Robert Rossen, producer
• Best Actor - Broderick Crawford as Willie Stark
• Best Supporting Actress - Mercedes McCambridge as Sadie Burke

It was also nominated for

• Best Supporting Actor - John Ireland as Jack Burden
• Best Director - Robert Rossen
• Best Film Editing - Al Clark and Robert Parrish
• Best Writing, Screenplay - Robert Rossen

In 2001 the United States Library of Congress deemed the film "culturally significant" and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry.

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See Also: List of movies - List of actors - List of directors - List of documentaries - List of Hollywood movie studios