“Truth” and “Spotlight” and the News

Cate Blanchett as Producer Mary Mapes, Robert Redford as Dan Rather
Cate Blanchett as Producer Mary Mapes, Robert Redford as Dan Rather
Spotlight_(film)_poster
Rachel McAdams, Michael Keaton, Mark Ruffalo, Lev Schreiver, and Brian D’arcy James as the Pulitzer Prize winning Boston Globe team

The ultimate goal of every great reporter is to find a terrific story that nobody else has, and report it.  Right now, released almost simultaneously, are not one,  but two movies about journalism and how it works.  In one, eagerness to tell the tale combined with politics to destroy the story, and several stellar careers.  In the other, universal caution and the power of the establishment combined in efforts to do the same.  Based on true stories, Truth and Spotlight portray, with fierce and sometimes heartbreaking commitment, the professional, ethical and political challenges every good reporter faces.

Each features a wonderful cast:  in Spotlight, Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton, Rachel McAdams, Liev Schreiber, John Slattery, and Stanley Tucci; in Truth, Cate Blanchett, Robert Redford, Topher Grace, Dennis Quaid, Elizabeth Moss, Bruce Greenwood and Stacy Keach.  They’re all great.

Both stories beautifully illustrate the adventure, pain, excitement, drudgery and teamwork required in the service of a seriously reported story.  Although Spotlight is a far better film, the familiar TV-ness of Truth, as Dan Rather and his 60 Minutes production team, pursue the “George W. Bush Went AWOL from the National Guard” story made it particularly heartbreaking for me.  I emerged agitated and halfway out of breath.

It’s was just so sad to witness great work sidelined not by corporate politics or even overt censorship but by small decisions made in service of a great story and a tight deadline.   All good journalists understand the importance of this: “If you don’t have time to check one more way, or listen to the person who still has reservations, the story shouldn’t air; if it’s about the President of the United States, even airtight isn’t good enough.”  Eager to get on the air and armed with several good pieces of evidence, Mapes insisted the story was ready though – and so it aired.

In this case, although the story was never proven to be false, challenges to errors or lack of clarity in several small details (which were indeed careless or at least a product of selective listening) provided enough ammunition to cost both Rather and Mapes their jobs.  In each case the removal was deeply humiliating.   Knowing what was coming, it was agony to witness, especially when the entire editorial process was so familiar and the problem elements stood out so clearly.

Spotlight, again drawn from a true story, followed reporters uncovering the child sex abuse scandal in the Catholic Church, revealed by the Boston Globe’s investigative unit the “Spotlight” team at the Boston Globe.  In this case, the adversary wasn’t the White House and all the weapons at its disposal,  Rather, it was one of the few institutions with more power: the Catholic Church and its hold over Boston and the Globe, whose readers were 56% Catholic as were much of the editorial staff.

Piece by piece, through roadblocks and threats, the team pulled the story of the abusive priests together, with victims on the record, only to be confronted by their new editor, who wasn’t satisfied that this information alone would bring change:

Show me that the church manipulated the system so that these guys wouldn’t have to face charges. Show me they put those same priests back into parishes time and time again. Show me this was systemic, that came from the top down.”

So they did.  And their story rocked the Church worldwide.  Literally.

To arrive there though, team members had to deal not only with the pain of the victims and horror of the story but also with their own relationships with the Church.  That wasn’t just deep connection or lapsed faith, but also an emotional and spiritual system internalized by these longtime-Boston journalists as they grew up their very Catholic hometown.

In this case though, a combination of fierce commitment and great editorial guidance allowed them to resolve any questions that might arise before their initial story ran.  They ended up writing hundreds.  And won the Pulitzer Prize.

So.  Two news movies.  Both worth the time and money it will take to see them. Together they bring us perfect lessons: this is what happens when newsgathering doesn’t live up to the tough standards required of the profession, and these are the remarkable things that can happen when it does.

 

 

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Cynthia Samuels

Cynthia Samuels is a long-time blogger, writer, producer and Managing Editor. She has an extensive background online, on television and in print, with particular experience developing content for women, parents and families. For the past nine years, that experience has been largely with bloggers, twitter and other social media, most recently at Care2's Causes Channels, which serve 20 million members (13 million when she joined) and cover 16 subject areas. In her three years at Care2 monthly page views grew tenfold, from 450,000 to 4 million. She has been part a member of BlogHer since 2006 years and has spoken at several BlogHer conferences. Among her many other speaking appearances is Politics Online, Fem 2.0 Conference and several other Internet gatherings. She’s also run blogger outreach for clients ranging from EchoDitto to To the Contrary. Earlier, she spent nearly four years with iVillage, the leading Internet site for women; her assignments included the design and supervision of the hugely popular Education Central, a sub-site of Parent Soup that was a soup-to-nuts parent toolkit on K-12 education, designed to support parents as advocates and supporters of their school-age kids. She also served as the iVillage partner for America Links Up, a major corporate Internet safety initiative for parents, ran Click! – the computer channel - and had a long stint as iVillage's Washington editor. In addition, she has developed parent content for Jim Henson Interactive and served as Children’s Book Editor for both Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble.com. Before moving online, she had a long and distinguished career as a broadcast journalist, as senior national editor of National Public Radio, political and planning producer of NBC's Today Show (whose audience is 75% women) where she worked for nine years (and was also the primary producer on issues relating to child care, education, learning disabilities and child development), and as the first executive producer of Channel One, a daily news broadcast seen in 12,000 U.S. high schools. She has published a children’s book: It’s A Free Country, a Young Person’s Guide to Politics and Elections (Atheneum, 1988) and numerous children’s book reviews in the New York Times Book Review and Washington Post Book World. A creator of online content since 1994, Samuels is a partner at The Cobblestone Team, LLC, is married to a doctor and recent law school graduate and has two grown sons who make video games, two amazing daughters-in-law and three adorable grandsons.

2 thoughts on ““Truth” and “Spotlight” and the News”

  1. I just saw Spotlight and was very moved by how difficult it was for the reporters and editors to overcome their own personal relationships with the Catholic Church to report fairly on the events. Excellent movie, painstakingly depicted by superior actors…so worth while!

    1. I agree Jackie! I grew up along the Monongahela River where almost everyone was Catholic and my friends literally used to pray for my soul! It’s an amazingly impactful religion. Glad you too liked the film. I can tell from your comments that the two of us have much in common.

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