TCM is scheduling a bunch of patriotic movies today – not war films, just films that celebrate or typify America. One of the best of them, and the most unusual, is the 1972 movie musical 1776, about the sweltering summer in which the founding fathers crafted the Declaration of Independence. Howard Da Silva stars as Benjamin Franklin, and Ken Howard as Thomas Jefferson, but the real star of this movie is someone who was lionized subsequently in an HBO miniseries: John Adams, played here with flair, wit and a lot of flint by William Daniels. Blythe Danner, Gwyneth Paltrow’s mother, plays Martha Jefferson – and coincidentally, Danner’s husband, TV writer-producer Bruce Paltrow, later provided starring TV roles for both Howard and Daniels. Howard starred in The White Shadow, and Daniels later starred in St. Elsewhere.