The two biggest box office hits of the moment, Michael and The Devil Wears Prada 2, are unique as “period flashbacks”; they are, at once, of the present and the past. Could they be the model for a new genre?
If so, would filmgoers revisit that model for an updated All the President’s Men? Fifty years ago audiences were riveted by that thriller that focused on two relentless newsmen, played by Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman, who were digging into the seedy mysteries of the Watergate scandal.
Several name filmmakers believe they could today create a contemporary political procedural to play against the drama of the Jeffrey Epstein scandal. The stakes of political drama in a Trumpian era might prove enticing to audiences — studies in the abuse of money and power. Scripts and budgets await decision.
President’s Men was a hit both at the box office and the Oscars but it faced serious obstacles along the way. The script was lacking in action and romance. The identity of Deep Throat — code name for the mysterious leaker — was never revealed. Twenty years later, we learned it was a top FBI man.
Further, the Nixon-era conspirators in real life were tedious corporate types with names like Haldeman and Ehrlichman who Alan Pakula, the director, found impossible to cast. “They were as ‘blah’ as their strategy,” he assured me at the time.
Pakula would have relished casting idiosyncratic characters like a Kash Patel or a Kristy Noem for roles in his contemporary President’s Men. That would have meant a long wait.
Tactful and politically astute, Pakula had earlier directed The Parallax View, the Warren Beatty thriller about political assassinations. He was thus keenly alert to the off-camera intrigues potentially surrounding President’s Men (personal disclosure: Pakula and I had worked together on several movies).
Katherine Graham, the then-publisher of the Washington Post, was facing intense pressure to pull support from the investigative zeal of Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, her young reporting stars.
Ben Bradlee, her top editor (Jason Robards in the movie) daily reminded her that the New York Times was closing in on a similar exposé. The Times’ possible victory would bruise the Post’s reputation (they were destined to clash again over the Pentagon Papers).
Meanwhile, on-set tensions arose between Redford and William Goldman, the film’s revered screenwriter. Redford was so edgy about his dialogue that he closed a secret deal with two indie writers to develop a draft behind Goldman’s back. Pakula was appalled.
Redford sought to play the Bob Woodward character as reserved and calculating, while Hoffman, as Carl Bernstein, was manic and chain-smoking.
Both characters were fearful that their news sources were possibly leading them down the wrong path and that rival reporters on the New York Times would end up scooping them. Their careers were at stake and, more importantly, so was the towering scandal of Watergate itself. The parade of news stories ultimately led, of course, to Nixon’s resignation.
Would a Watergate-like thriller set in the Donald Trump era deliver equal emotional clout? And would today’s more bizarre cast of characters prove even more compelling? More relevant, would newly merged studios support it, given their concern for regulatory support?
“I’m going to fall on my face this time,” Pakula assured me the day before the start of principal photography on President’s Men. His apprehensions were misdirected: Fifty years ago, All the President’s Men was a smash, and indeed some filmgoers crave a new version.
And some filmmakers are eager for the chance.