W. Joseph Campbell

, , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Fact-checking Watergate advice that ‘worked’

In Cinematic treatments, Debunking, Washington Post, Watergate myth on March 11, 2011 at 8:32 am

In an online commentary posted yesterday, media critic Eric Alterman treated as factual the most famous invented line of the Watergate scandal, “Follow the money.”

As I’ve noted at Media Myth Alert, “follow the money” was advice written into the screenplay of All the President’s Men, the 1976 cinematic version of the book by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein about their Watergate reporting for the Washington Post.

Felt: Didn't say it

The line was spoken by the actor Hal Holbrook, who in the movie played Woodward’s secretive high-level source, “Deep Throat” (who in real life turned out to be W. Mark Felt, formerly the second-ranking official at the FBI).

“Follow the money” doesn’t appear in All the President’s Men, the book.

It appears in no Post article or editorial published during the Watergate period.

And in his periodic meetings with Woodward (he never spoke with Bernstein during Watergate), “Deep Throat”/Felt never uttered the line.

Alterman, the author of  What Liberal Media? and other books, ruminated in his commentary about what he called the willingness of people in politics and the media “to debase themselves for cash.”

His essay appeared beneath the headline, “Think Again: ‘Follow the Money’,” and opened with an allusion to “follow the money,” declaring:

“Deep Throat’s advice worked for Woodward and Bernstein, and it remains useful today.”

Maybe it is “useful” still.

But it is a made-up line.

Screenwriter William Goldman has taken credit for writing “follow the  money” into the script of All the President’s Men, which came out in April 1976 — 20 months after Watergate reached a denouement with the resignation of President Richard Nixon.

Since then, millions of people have repeated the evocative and pithy line, oblivious to its derivation and unaware of its falsity.

As I point out in my latest book, Getting It Wrong, “Turns of phrase that sound too neat and tidy often are too perfect to be true.”

So it is with “follow the money”: Too good to be true.

In that respect, it’s akin to William Randolph Hearst’s purported vow to “furnish the war” with Spain. That famous line is almost certainly apocryphal, as I discuss in Getting It Wrong, which addresses and debunks 10 prominent media-driven myths.

But why bother calling attention to “follow the money”? After all, the movie into which the line was written is nearly 35 years old.

It matters because historical accuracy matters.

As I’ve noted, “follow the money” suggests that rolling up Watergate was a case of identifying and pursuing a money trail. There was, though, much more to the scandal than that.

Nixon lost the presidency not because of illegal campaign contributions but because he obstructed justice in the investigation of the scandal’s signal crime, the break-in in June 1972 at the Democratic National Committee headquarters.

All the President’s Men the movie doesn’t reach that level of complexity.

Calling attention to “follow the money” also matters because of the power and influence invested in the cinema.

I note in Getting It Wrong that high-quality cinematic treatments can be “powerful agents of media myth-making, and can enhance a myth’s durability.”

Richard Bernstein, in an essay published in 1989 in the New York Times, offered a thoughtful discussion about cinema’s capacity to shape perceptions about historical events. Although Bernstein didn’t mention All the President’s Men, his essay is germane nonetheless.

He noted that “even small details have value as history.

“To change them is the rough cinematic equivalent of a newspaper’s inventing quotations on the grounds that, even if nobody actually made the quoted statement, it represents what people were thinking or feeling at the time.”

Indeed.

Bernstein’s essay quoted Richard Slotkin, a Wesleyan University English and American studies professor, as saying:

”Even when you know that something didn’t happen, movie photography gives you the illusion that it did.”

And that helps explain the wide and enduring appeal of “follow the money”: The made-up line was delivered by Holbrook with such quiet assurance and dramatic effect that it offered the illusion of having been advice essential to investigating Watergate.

That is, to being advice that “worked.”

WJC

Many thanks to Instapundit Glenn Reynolds for linking to this post

Recent and related:

  1. […] TELL TRUTH FROM FICTION: Eric Alterman’s Watergate allusion is corrected by Prof. Joseph Campbell. Well, Alterman probably thinks it was Sarah Palin, not Tina Fey, who said “I can see Russia […]

    Instapundit » Blog Archive » CAN’T TELL TRUTH FROM FICTION: Eric Alterman’s Watergate allusion is corrected by Prof. Joseph Camp… 11 March 2011 at 8am

  2. […] Fact-checking Watergate advice that ‘worked’ Most of America learns history from the movies. Hollywood movies. That’s almost as bad as learning it in public school. […]

    200th Friday Linkzookery – 11 Mar 2011 11 March 2011 at 3pm

  3. […] Fact-checking Watergate advice that ‘worked’ In an online commentary posted yesterday, media critic Eric Alterman treated as factual the most famous invented line […] […]

    Top Posts — WordPress.com 11 March 2011 at 7pm

  4. […] Fact-checking Watergate advice that ‘worked’ (via Media Myth Alert) Posted on March 12, 2011 by npb1 In an online commentary posted yesterday, media critic Eric Alterman treated as factual the most famous invented line of the Watergate scandal, "Follow the money." As I've noted at Media Myth Alert, "follow the money" was advice written into the screenplay of All the President's Men, the 1976 cinematic version of the book by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein about their Watergate reporting for the Washington Post.

    Fact-checking Watergate advice that ‘worked’ (via Media Myth Alert) | Top world news online 12 March 2011 at 6am

  6. […] was written into the script of All the President’s Men, the 1976 movie about the Watergate reporting of the Washington Post, and has since made a smooth, seamless transition to the […]

    Counterpunching that made-up line, ‘follow the money’ « Media Myth Alert 15 March 2011 at 9am

  7. […] like to see blogs calling out the Washington Post, an unevenly edited shell of its former […]

    WaPo ‘broke the Watergate scandal’? No way « Media Myth Alert 17 March 2011 at 7am

  8. […] Fact-checking Watergate advice that ‘worked’ […]

    WaPo ‘played pivotal role’ in Watergate? Think again « Media Myth Alert 24 March 2011 at 7am

  9. […] Fact-checking Watergate advice that ‘worked’ […]

    Something exaggerated in hero-worship of Woodward « Media Myth Alert 21 April 2011 at 9am

  10. […] Felt never offered Woodward the advice of “follow the […]

    ‘Follow the money’: You won’t find that line in the book « Media Myth Alert 27 April 2011 at 4am

  11. […] Fact-checking Watergate advice that ‘worked’ […]

    A ‘follow the money’ hat trick « Media Myth Alert 14 May 2011 at 9am

  12. […] “Fact-checking Watergate advice that worked,” which was posted March 11 and discussed the most famous made-up line associated with the scandal, “Follow the money.” […]

    Recalling that a ‘debunker’s work is never done’ « Media Myth Alert 20 May 2011 at 5am

  13. […] I’ve discussed at Media Myth Alert, Felt never offered such guidance to Woodward. He never advised the reporter to “follow the […]

    Six years on: ‘Deep Throat’s’ identity revealed « Media Myth Alert 29 May 2011 at 6am

  14. […] does the advice to “follow the money” appear in All the President’s Men, Woodward and Bernstein’s book […]

    Commodity markets and Watergate’s most famous made-up line « Media Myth Alert 15 June 2011 at 7am

  16. […] Fact-checking Watergate advice that ‘worked’ […]

    The Fin Times and the ‘mantra’ of Watergate « Media Myth Alert 28 July 2011 at 7am

  17. […] Many people and many news outlets over the years have cited “follow the money” as if it were real, as if it had been advice to Woodward that really worked. […]

    India high court order invokes phony Watergate line « Media Myth Alert 2 August 2011 at 9am

  21. […] Times, Fox News, the Huffington Post, Minnesota Public Radio, the Providence Journal, media critic Eric Alterman, the Hindu newspaper in India, among others, in invoking the line as if it had been advice […]

    ‘Immortal advice’ given only in a movie « Media Myth Alert 23 November 2011 at 8am

  22. […] retrospective discussed the 1976 film All The President’s Men, noting that it “won four Oscars and was nominated for four […]

    Runup to the Oscars: ‘Politically inspired movies’ and the myth of Watergate | Media Myth Alert 22 February 2013 at 2pm

  24. […] Fact-checking Watergate advice that ‘worked’ […]

    Who chased Nixon from office? Not Woodward, Bernstein | Media Myth Alert 2 June 2015 at 2pm

  25. […] Fact-checking Watergate advice that ‘worked’ […]

    Who chased Nixon from office? Not Woodward, Bernstein | Media Myth Alert 2 June 2015 at 2pm

Comments are closed.

%d bloggers like this: