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PEOPLE & ARTS Monday 4 deceMber 2017
HBO film looks at legendary Washington Post editor Bradlee

By DAVID BAUDER coming movie “The Post.” much of his personality was it’s the lie that is the enemy days before the president’s
AP Media Writer The HBO project was in- in his bearing, his presence. of the people, and not the assassination in 1963. It’s
NEW YORK (AP) — The stigated by Bradlee’s son I wanted that to be in the reporters and journalists hard to conceive, in this
White House is hostile to the Quinn, who suggested it to film.” who are trying to expose era, of a president and a
press, public figures misbe- HBO. During some of the Post’s the lie.” reporter with such a re-
have and a vital Washing- “It’s hard not to fall in love battles with the Nixon ad- Quinn’s participation in lationship; Bradlee was
ton Post is at the center of with a guy like Ben — man ministration, a clip of White making “The Newspaper- Washington bureau chief
the national conversation. or woman,” said film direc- House press secretary Ron man” essentially amounted of Newsweek at the time.
Think any of those things tor John Maggio. “Because Ziegler passes by and you to giving the first interview. Hard to imagine, and hard
are new? he just lived life in the mo- half expect to hear the She said she was pleased to justify, too: the film quotes
HBO’s film on the legend- ment — a very large life phrase “fake news.” The with the final product. “She veteran PBS journalist Jim
ary Post editor Ben Bradlee — and was there for some parallels are eerie. was Ben’s wife, but she’s Lehrer saying “you can’t
proves otherwise. “The of the most important mo- Bradlee would likely have a journalist,” Maggio said, be a friend of the president
Newspaperman: The Life ments of the second half of been conflicted covering “and I really came to re- and a reporter, too.”
and Times of Ben Bradlee,” the 20th Century.” Trump, said his widow, Sally spect the distance she kept Quinn said both men had
which debuts Monday at 8 from me.” their eyes wide open to
p.m. ET on the cable net- This undated photo provided by HBO shows former Washington The film doesn’t gloss over conflicts. Bradlee got
work, feels strikingly con- Post Executive Editor Ben Bradlee in the newsroom in Washington. difficult or controversial as- scoops, and Kennedy
temporary as it follows the Associated Press pects of Bradlee’s life. He probably got some favor-
editor through his Boston Maggio found the perfect Quinn. He would have rel- was married three times, able coverage. But she
upbringing, friendship with narrator for most of the ished a great story, and un- and the first two didn’t end said Kennedy shunned Bra-
President John F. Kennedy film in Bradlee himself. He derstood the need to oper- pleasantly. The film spends dlee for one three-month
and leadership through re- died in 2014, but Maggio ate with great care. He was considerable time on Janet period because he didn’t
lease of the Pentagon Pa- unearthed an audio book also a patriot who fought Cooke’s fake story about a like something he wrote,
pers and the Watergate that Bradlee had recorded in World War II, and would child heroin user, the big- until their wives got to-
scandal that took down in 1994. have been greatly con- gest blot on his record at gether and forced them to
former President Richard “When I heard that voice, cerned with what was hap- the Post. Bradlee’s close make peace.
Nixon. that smoky, Brahmin growl pening in the White House, friendship with Kennedy is Only after Kennedy’s death
It’s part of a resurgence of of a voice, I knew I had to she said. explored, complete with did Bradlee learned some
attention for Bradlee, who have it in the film,” he said. “Ben’s whole life was about footage of the two men startling news.
is portrayed by Tom Hanks “The film took on a whole getting to the truth,” she and their wives enjoying
in Steven Spielberg’s up- new character for me. So said. “When you look at it, a weekend together only Continued on Page 31