Overview
- The four-part limited series premiered Nov. 6 on Netflix and adapts Candice Millard’s Destiny of the Republic.
- Michael Shannon plays President James A. Garfield opposite Matthew Macfadyen as Charles J. Guiteau, with Betty Gilpin, Nick Offerman and Bradley Whitford among the ensemble.
- Editors describe choices designed to cultivate empathy for both central figures and to balance humor with tragedy, highlighting the careful construction of a pivotal encounter.
- Reporting separates documented history from invention, noting that a raucous boxing-night outing and a prison meeting with Lucretia Garfield are fictional, while Guiteau’s Oneida ties and his execution poem are factual.
- Fact checks reaffirm that Garfield was shot on July 2, 1881 and later died from infection linked to unsanitary medical care, and that portions of Guiteau’s brain were preserved for study.