Book Vs Movie: “All the President’s Men” (1976)
The Margos search for 70’s creeps, dogged reporting, and “Deep Throat”
“Follow the money.” The Watergate scandal of the early 1970s made headlines around the world as Richard Nixon and his loyal group of henchmen basically tried to intimidate their way into making Nixonian policies the law of the land (while breaking the law!)
And they would have gotten away with it too if it weren’t for those meddling Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein who painstakingly investigated the Watergate hotel break-in for years. Under the leadership of publisher Katharine Graham and editor Ben Bradlee, Woodward and Bernstein helped expose the corruption of the Nixon administration and made newspapers look cool.
“All the President’s Men” was published in 1974 and immediately became a bestseller and made stars out the Washington Post team. So, of course, Hollywood came calling with an adaptation directed by Alan J. Pakula and a screenplay by past Book Vs Movie subject William Goldman.
Robert Redford’s production company “Wildwood Enterprises” helped bring together the team which includes himself play Bob Woodward and Dustin Hoffman as Carl Bernstein. Jason Robards won a Best Supporting Actor Academy Award for playing Ben Bradlee.
So between book & movie–which did we like better? Have a listen!
In this ep the Margos discuss:
- The true story of Nixon’s crimes and why he almost got away with his multiple crimes
- The process of reporting and how much work went into it in a short period of time
- Who was “Deep Throat” and why didn’t anyone listen to Nora Ephron?
- The cast: Robert Redford (Woodward,) Dustin Hoffman (Carl Bernstein,) Jason Robards (Ben Bradlee,) Jack Warden (Harrey Rosenfeld,) Martin Balsam (Howard Simons,) Hal Holbrook (Deep Throat,) Jane Alexander (Bookkeeper,) and Ned Beatty (Dardis.)
Clips used:
- All The President’s Men trailer
- Woodward and Bernstein decide who is the better writer
- Woodward and Berstein working on the story
- Deep Throat gives advice
- Ben Bradlee stands by the story
- Music by David Shire
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Margo D. @BrooklynFitChik www.brooklynfitchick.com [email protected]
Margo P. @ShesNachoMama https://coloniabook.weebly.com/
