Dream On, featuring political comedian John Fugelsang as he retraces the journey of Alexis de Tocqueville in 1831, will be screened at the UUFDC on Tuesday, October 18 at 4:30 pm.

Following in the Frenchman’s footsteps, Fugelsang speaks with fast-food workers and retirees, prisoners and entrepreneurs, undocumented immigrants and community organizers about their hopes, dreams, and daily struggles. Dream On explores whether the optimistic spirit of the American Dream that Tocqueville observed is alive and well in the twenty-first century, or whether George Carlin was right when he famously quipped, “It’s called the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it.”

In recent years the venerable American Dream has become an empty promise for increasing numbers of Americans. Millions of middle class Americans are now unable to maintain the standard of living that they took for granted growing up, and more low-income families are unable to lift themselves out of poverty. Reviving the American Dream has now become one of the most critical challenges facing our nation.

“Most Americans believe that the term ‘working poor’ should be an oxymoron: if you work full time, you should not be poor,” says director Roger Weisberg. “But today, one in four American workers, 30 million people, earn less than the federal poverty level for a family of four. John Fugelsang adds, “The old adage—that hard work will lead to prosperity—may no longer be true for the majority of Americans. Yet, most of the people I met on my Tocqueville journey still believed in the dream, even when their daily struggles made it feel impossibly out of reach.”   (2015, 99 minutes)