Cancelling the The Reagans

""The Reagans" Cancellation: Harvest of Shame Bowing to relentless pressure from conservatives, CBS pulled the miniseries "The Reagans" from their lineup, despite maintaining that each scene in the script was verifiably accurate. The campaign for self-censorship was billed by the NYT as "one of the fierce assaults that have become so familiar whenever the right wants to scare the media on an ideological question." RNC Chairman Ed Gillespie had only one specific complaint - that President Reagan never explained AIDS-related deaths with the words " those who live in sin die in sin." The producers never disputed the fact that "The Reagans," like all made-for-TV docudramas, had fictionalized dialogue and based the line on Reagan's authorized biography, Dutch by Edmund Morris, where he is quoted saying "maybe the lord brought down this plague" because "illicit sex is against the Ten Commandments." (Ronald Regan himself was an actor who depicted historical characters using fictionalized dialogue - including his famous portrayal of "the Gipper" in a 1940 Knute Rockne biopic). Gillespie suggests that the film be vetted by "a panel of people who actually know the Reagans personally." Pattie Davis, daughter of President Regan who apparently obtained a copy of the script, didn't wait for an invitation from CBS to set the record straight. In a column on she wrote for Time.com, she condemned the accuracy of a scene depicting her stealing tranquilizers from her mother Nancy's medicine cabinet. Yes, Davis admits, her mother used tranquilizers. And yes, Davis did steal them from her mother's medicine cabinet. But Davis complains that the film omitted the fact that "many women in the Sixties were prescribed tranquilizers" and her mother Nancy "never noticed hers were missing." Davis also argued that her father must have had a compassionate view towards AIDS victims because once, after she commented that Rock Hudson looked "weird" kissing Doris Day in a movie, her father said that Hudson "didn't really have a lot of experience kissing women" and would rather "be kissing a man." THE DOUBLE STANDARD: Gillespie suggested that, if CBS refused to have the movie vetted, they should run a scroll across the bottom of the screen every ten minutes informing viewers that viewer "should not consider [the miniseries] to be historically accurate." (Question: Did you make a similar request for JFK: Reckless Youth; LBJ: The Early Years; Marilyn and Bobby: Her Final Affair; or Eleanor and Franklin all miniseries which had real inaccuracies?) Bill O'Reilly predicted that "[i]fCBS goes ahead with the film, I believe any company that sponsors it will take a huge hit, as will the network ." CBS CEO Les Moonves "watched the miniseries multiple times" each time removing content before deciding that it "crossed the line." Eric Alterman , fellow at the Center for American progress summed it up this way: "It worked. They're really good at this. I don't really blame them for it. They're not historians ... They're just cultural warriors, and they're winning." WHERE WAS THE CONCERN FOR HISTORICAL ACCURACY THEN?: Gillespie and other conservatives expressed little concern for balance an accuracy when they aired the docudrama "DC 9/11: A Time of Crisis" that aired on Showtime, owned by CBS's parent company, in September. That movie was described by the Washington Post on September 6 as using "the tragic attack on America in 2001 as the basis for a reelection campaign movie on behalf of George W. Bush" and "an insult to those who perished in the attacks." The movie was written, with the cooperation of the Bush Administration, by conservative Lionel Chetwynd, who "admits to a bias in Bush's favor." In the film, as Air Force One flies aimlessly, the fictional Bush repeatedly demands he be taken to the White House at one point demanding "Get me home! . . . the American people want to know where their damn president is." But "the most troubling issues raised by the attack -- including the horrendous failure of U.S. intelligence -- are not mentioned or are briskly glossed over." CRITICISM CONTINUES DESPITE ABSENCE OF SUBSTANTIVE CHARGES: CBS has sold "The Reagans" to Showtime, a pay channel owned by its parent company Viacom, but Gillespie still isn't satisfied. He said that "misleading a smaller audience of viewers is not a noble response to the legitimate concerns raised about this program" and renewed his call for the periodic scroll disclaiming the films accuracy. (Question: What, specifically, is inaccurate about this film?) For those who want a fair and balanced account of the Reagan years the RNC is hawking a their own account of the Reagan years , "The Real Reagan."" American Progress Report