The play, 12 Angry Men by Reginald Rose, is an attention-grabbing play that exhibits the American judicial system in an organized way. The play is about a teenager who is being trialed for committing the murder of his own father, and the jury, consisting of 12 men, is seated in a room to discuss and decide his fate. Moreover, the jury comes to a standstill when juror number 8 declines to choose ‘guilty’ for the convict unlike the others. However justice served in the end when he is able to convince the other jurors and is able to prove that the boy is not guilty.
As stated by the title “Twelve Angry Men” the play shows the anger demonstrated by the jurors while defending their perspectives of the young man. One can see the anger erupting when the jurors get into a conflict, while stating their decisions, giving a glimpse into the past incidents taking place in the lives of these men. However, some jurors dealt with the case politely trying to calm things down, showing their sophistication. The word ‘twelve’ relates to the number of people in the jury, which is an exception for this play, as federal and state courts can even have six jurors at a time. Rose by the word ‘angry’ in the title is trying to lay emphasis on the conflicts occurring while the jury is deciding upon the verdict. The tensions in the room tend to augment and descend all through the play when the men interact with each other to reach to a common decision. It shows that the author is trying to lay emphasis on the point how can anger take over an individual’s thinking and direct him towards making wrong decisions. Moreover the word ‘Men’ relates that all the members of the jury are white men because at that time in the U.S. women were not considered as significant as men in a society.
The play demonstrates three key elements of the justice system. Firstly, according to the law the convict is innocent until there are proofs of his guilt. Secondly the verdict must be undisputed, as this projects anything unjust and the third is that the convict can be proved guilty only when there is no doubt among the jury. The play focuses on significant societal problems with clearness and moderation, relating them to individual issues by the use of complicated description.
The theme of the play describes that one should not to be prejudiced about others and believe that there is a reasonable doubt. Prejudiced can be explained as hasty judgment or biasness. In the play a boy has been charged for the murder of his father and the Jurors, who have their own pasts relating with the situation, have to decide his fate. Throughout the play we find two opposite views about justice, as the eighth juror is in favor of the boy where as the others accused him because they wanted to, instead of reaching a verdict based upon the consequences. The 6th juror clearly says "Suppose you talk us outta this and the kid really did knife his father', which appears to be revenge, where as the third juror is against the convict possibly because of his age and it reminded him of his son who always troubled him and out of rage wanted to prove this boy guilty of charge. Reginald Rose plays off two sided nature of justice, where everyone wants justice which is not clear right through the play.
Racial prejudice seems prevalent right through the play, as the 9th juror accused him as 'one of them' though in the whole play nothing is mentioned about the race of the accused but there are hints that he belongs to a minority of some kind. The 8th juror had sympathy for the accused not because he wanted to save him but he could picture out his own poor and difficult life he faced with his son, basically he also lived in the “slums” like the convict.
The entire play revolves around another theme, ‘doubt’, that is whether the convict is guilty or not. Although there are tremendous evidences against the convict, the 8th juror turned the verdict 'beyond a reasonable doubt' that the convict is accused guilty and finally justice and right overcome irrationality and prejudice, however, the truth was not known. This theme of doubt as to who is 'right' is found all through the play creating doubt among the characters as well as the audience.
In the play the conflict was one against many, where the 8th juror votes 'not guilty' against 11 jurors who vote 'guilty' the 10th juror shouts, 'boy -oh-boy! There is always one ' and the protagonist, the eighth juror, tries to convince the eleven antagonists. This shows an enthusiastic attack on many jurors against one to be right. However the play takes a reverse turn and pronounce the accused 'not guilty' when the protagonist is able to show the real facts to the rest of the members. Rose states a compelling perspective to distinguish the two moments and also describes the jurors feeling convincingly.
The theme of class discrimination is prominent in the play, where the jurors belong to different classes of the life in America. For instance, the 4th juror is a wealthy stock broker; the 5th juror belonged to a slum category, the 7th juror earns 28000 dollars by selling marmalade and the 8th juror had very poor upbringing and had a criminal record but could not get justice due to his poor status. This brings forward the point as to whether the American justice was fair among classes or not. Furthermore, the 3rd and 8th juror had difficult father and son relationship, similar to the accused, who also portrays such relationship. Hence, the 8th juror can relate to the accused when he had difficult times with his own son for two years, whereas, the 3rd juror is prejudiced against him. The foreman, on the other hand, supports the votes to ‘not guilty’ as he points out that the killer might have taken sometime to first wipe his hands before he left the scene.
The play revolves around generations with men in different age groups, where the place time and characters remain anonymous. The jurors are rated by numbers or 'defendants', the convict by 'boy' or simply 'accused' and the witnesses as 'the downstairs neighbors’ and “the old man” and so on to keep the anonymity of the characters. The place too is not fixed, it could be the jury room, in ‘New York’ or 'Wisconsin' the entire play is based on American population making it a social drama. However, the weather is described as hot and summery and that all the jurors are confined inside a room to discuss and decide upon a mutual verdict. They are all seated facing each other that is on ‘a long conference table’ as a form of a group and only juror number eight was proposing ‘not guilty’ for the boy whereas the others reached the verdict ‘guilty’. The amalgamation of characters in the jury room relates to the fact that the room portrays the entire community in which we live because of the jurors’ vast backgrounds and attitudes. The existence of the court room scene in the play is far ahead of merely a jury room setting, enlightening an aesthetic significance.
The descriptive directions show that the jurors had to work as a group, in order to reach a unanimous decision. It is natural that the audience relate themselves with juror eight because of his heroic actions of persuading the other eleven jurors, but this action is considered fictitious and is nothing like real life, because it is against group dynamics used in taking such decisions. In group discussions it is difficult for one person to convince the rest towards his ideas; hence in such cases as the one shown in Twelve Angry Men, the outcome would have been a hung jury, whereas Rose did not end it with this result.
The description of the facial expressions of the characters given in between the scenes create pictures in mind and one can relate to the feelings of the jurors at the time of discussions. For instance number two ‘looks at him nervously’ shows the timidity of the juror and how he is intimidated by the other and similarly number 7 ‘nods sympathetically’ towards number 10 who is blowing his nose shows he is concerned of his health. Similarly other descriptions such as, ‘sarcastically’ ‘quietly’, ‘timidly’ ‘flustered’ and so on add emotions to the characters’ words and help in understanding the situation even better.
The juror number 3, snaps and shouts at his colleagues when he sees that they are reverting from their decision of ‘guilty’ towards number eight’s verdict of ‘not guilty’ because of his reasoning of the circumstances the boy was in. He shouts, “What is this? Love Your Underprivileged Brother Week or Something?” and tries to get them to take not change their decision and accuse the boy for committing first degree murder of his father. He was outraged by the young workers discussing about teenagers ‘at a risk of offending’ or about police chiefs who continuously talk about ‘social exclusion’. His antagonist behavior portrays him as a forceful intolerable bully and hence is not acceptable by the audience who find their hero in the juror number eight who convinces the others to rethink their decision of accusing the boy of murder.
Though the play Twelve Angry Men has artistic quality, it has flaws which do not support moral values. The juror number eight molds and dramatizes every piece of evidence and the witnesses’ statements and uses the term ‘reasonable doubt’ and takes it further that what logic has to say. He describes all the evidence and pulls out the flaws in judgment which is unlike reality rather it is a mere coincidence. In real life one cannot judge any witness in the manner juror number eight did in the play.
Furthermore, during the trial all the jurors wear a dark suit, but juror eight is found wearing a light colored one which is a sign of angel like character that shows goodness, while the dark color portrays the evilness of the characters. Broad thinking with an open mind in contrast to narrow mindedness, guilty or not guilty, enhances the atmosphere of the play where even the thunderstorm brings darkness to the room. The jurors turn the light on in order to get away from darkness, hence this shows that their narrow mindedness is also changing and they are becoming more open minded as juror number eight. The compromise of juror number 11 in allowing the others to leave the window open and the exchange of the seats with juror number 2 portrays that as a group the jurors can reach a decision together, hence portraying that they will come to a unanimous decision for the case of the boy as well.
It was interesting to read about the witness who belonged to a similar slum community as the boy but was considered to be speaking the truth whereas the boy was considered as a liar. This is brought forward by juror number eight “She’s on of them too?” and another juror related it to himself as he was once a part of a slum too. Hence when these double standards were brought forward the jurors started re judging their verdicts.
Though all the events conclude in the end that all the jurors had reached a verdict of ‘not guilty’ for the boy, however, the decision is not known as the play ends here leaving the readers undecided. Juror number eight was able to convince all of his colleagues, hence illustrating the fact that it is not sure that everything is what it appears to be. To sum up if it had not been because of the extraordinary character of juror number eight “justice would not have been served”. Though the boy reached his rightful decision, the play is more of a fiction and not the truth.
Works Cited
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Rose, Reginald. “Twelve Angry Men”. Web. 19 Nov. 2012. http://www.bgcs.k12.oh.us/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=%2FfgoYXhX68Y%3D&tabid=2379
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McKinstry, Leo. "Why the kid should have gone to the chair: Twelve Angry Men, released 50 years ago, is a movie classic, but, says Leo McKinstry, it is also liberal nonsense and has done much to weaken the criminal justice system." Spectator 15 Sept. 2007: 22+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 19 Nov. 2012. http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA169825680&v=2.1&u=miss17465&it=r&p=LitRC&sw=w
