My Fellow Americans

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If Watergate were to take place in present day America … can you just imagine the circus that would ensue? The media would wet itself. Blogs would blossom. And somewhere some brilliant entrepreneur would create a set of personality cards-much like baseball cards-and you could collect the entire set of characters; good guys and bad. I could’ve used those cards in ‘72. For the better part of June, July and August I couldn’t keep track of the personalities involved. I eventually gave up and stopped reading the paper and watching the news. Until David Frost came along.

I was never a Nixon hater, or fan, but I still remember the look on his face as he stumbled through a kind of apology to the American people in front of Frost. I felt then that somewhere in that spare sliver of history between those two men that day lay Shakespeare. I was right, Frost/Nixon, the new film by Ron Howard, adapted from the stage play by Tim Bevan is tragic drama that will take your breath from you. There were literally moments during the movie when the audience seemed to have collectively stopped breathing. I looked around thinking that maybe I was the only one who was awestruck by the film and everyone else had nodded off. Not the case. Everyone was glued to the screen as if they were witnessing a train wreck.

As I stood to leave the theater there was that familiar buzz that goes on after you’ve seen a fine film. People take up conversations with perfect strangers. “Hey, I didn’t know that S.O.B. played the piano.” Others talked about Vietnam and who they lost, and others talked about how Nixon opened China up for the world. One guy stopped me and made a comment about the fact that everyone in the theater was over fifty. I looked around, sure enough. And that’s too bad, because with fine acting from Michael Sheen (Frost), an absolutely stunning Academy Award winning performance from Frank Langella (Nixon), and the finest direction ever from Howard, Frost/Nixon should be an Academy winner but it‘s not carrying a large enough audience. If your much younger than forty-five, Nixon seems like ancient history-without the car crashes. And who wants to see that?

Content aside, if you’ve been paying attention here then I suppose you get my drift. Want to see the finest drama of the year? Then take in Frost/Nixon. Oh, by the way, I have two mint Ehrlichman cards that I’d be willing to trade for one Archibald Cox in like condition.