AllMovie

Valley Forge is a videotaped TV adaptation of Maxwell Anderson's 1934 play. Richard Basehart plays General George Washington, whose "shambles of an army" struggles to survive the bitter winter of 1777 at Valley Forge (there's plenty of soap-chip snow, and never mind that it wasn't all that snowy during the actual event). Though determined to hold out against the British, Washington is briefly tempted by the amnesty offer of General Howe (Harry Andrews). The prose gets mighty thick around the second act, but the actors (including Simon Ward, David Dukes and Nancy Marchand) handle Anderson's archaic speech patterns with strength and finesse. Originally telecast on NBC in 1975, Valley Forge was rebroadcast by PBS in the fall of 1976 as part of the nationwide Bicentennial celebration.