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After screening excerpts of Ken Burns’ documentary “The American Revolution” at the Freedom Mortgage Pavilion in Camden, N.J., on Thursday night, WHYY’s “Fresh Air” host Terry Gross admitted she knew relatively little about the war.
“I have to tell you, Ken, that this series was a revelation for me,” Gross said. “I never studied the Revolutionary War in depth. I knew bits and pieces.”
“The American Revolution” is a deep dive into the United States’ origin story, a 12-hour PBS film broadcasting as six episodes beginning November 16.
Documentary filmmaker Ken Burns was interviewed by Fresh Air host Terry Gross on stage at the Freedom Mortgage Pavilion in Camden, N.J. on October 9 2025. (Kimberly Paynter/WHYY)
Burns spent the day in Philadelphia and Camden to preview the film that begins with the indigenous Iroquois Nation’s governing model of democratically unified states, chronicles the evolving ideologies of independence and the tremendous amount of blood spilled to achieve it, and ends with the rippling impact of the revolution around the world.
“This was not just a revolution of ideas in Philadelphia, but a real revolution, a bloody one, a late 18th century war in which people die by muskets and bayonets and cannon taking off things,” Burns said. “It’s a civil war where Americans are killing other Americans.”
Gross interviewed Burns on stage before an audience of more than 3,200, which will be broadcast as a future episode of “Fresh Air.”
She was struck by how Burns’ film explained the many complexities of the Revolution. The colonies were far from united. Friction and disagreements cut across almost all lines, including religion, race, geography, class and politics.
Fresh Air host Terry Gross listens to documentary filmmaker Ken Burns during an interview about his new film about the American Revolution at the Freedom Mortgage Pavillion in Camden, N.J. on October 9, 2025. (Kimberly Paynter/WHYY)
“We always talk, especially now, about how divided our nation is. In my mind, that goes back to the Civil War,” Gross said. “But now I think that goes back to the founding. That goes back to The Revolution. We’ve always been divided.”
“The story of our revolution is encrusted with the barnacles of sentimentality,” Burns said. “They deserve to be scraped off and have the real story told, because the big ideas that happened across the river in Philadelphia remain even more important, become even more inspirational, when you know the extraordinarily violent, diverse story of the Revolution.”
