CBS Caved On The Reagans 12 Days Before It Was to Air

[otohara]

When did we first hear about the Path to 911? Either we're really slow or they were really good at keeping this film off the radar.


NEW YORK— Capping an extraordinary conservative furor over a movie virtually no one has seen, CBS said Tuesday it will not air “The Reagans” and shunt it off to the Showtime cable network instead.

Based on snippets of the script that had leaked out in recent weeks, conservatives, including the son of the former president, accused CBS of distorting the legacy of Ronald Reagan.

While CBS said it was not bowing to political pressure, critics said that was exactly the case and worried about the effects of such pre-emptive strikes on future work.

CBS believed it had ordered a love story about Ronald and Nancy Reagan with politics as a backdrop, but instead got a film that crossed the line into advocacy, said a network executive who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The film had been scheduled to air Nov. 16 and 18, in the heart of the November ratings sweeps. CBS attempted to edit the film to remove offending passages, but gave up.


Eventually, after several weeks of outspoken criticism by conservatives, on November 4, 2003, CBS withdrew the broadcast claiming that it did "not present a balanced portrayal of the Reagans" (<1>). The network chose instead to broadcast the miniseries on the premium cable channel Showtime, which along with CBS is owned by Viacom.
http://www.collegiatetimes.com/archive/2003-11/3/2371.html


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Reagans
About a month before it was scheduled to air, portions of a draft script of the documentary-drama were leaked and published by the New York Times and the Drudge Report. As a result of these stories, the miniseries began to be widely criticized by conservatives as an unbalanced and inaccurate depiction of Reagan. CBS reportedly had ordered a love story about Ronald and Nancy Reagan with politics as a backdrop, but instead received what they later claimed was an overtly political film. Supporters of the film claimed that these criticisms were simply partisan bias, and were an attempt to censor a film because it did not always portray the former president in positive light.

Conservatives began criticizing it before it was broadcast and claimed that it put words in Reagan's mouth and condemned it as "leftist" historical revisionism. Some of the criticism was based upon early drafts of the script and featured scenes that were either never shot or dropped from the final version. Eventually, after several weeks of outspoken criticism by conservatives, on November 4, 2003, CBS withdrew the broadcast claiming that it did "not present a balanced portrayal of the Reagans" (<1>). The network chose instead to broadcast the miniseries on the premium cable channel Showtime, which along with CBS is owned by Viacom.

CBS's denial that it was yielding to the furor did not persuade its critics. The producers of the movie noted that, before the outcry from Reagan loyalists, CBS had approved both the script for the miniseries and had seen dailies as they were shot, and the film had been approved by two sets of lawyers. Jeff Chester, head of the Center for Digital Democracy, a communications lobbying group, said that CBS had chosen not to offend Republicans at a time when the federal government was considering rules restricting ownership of local television stations. CBS executives "made a business decision," he said. "In doing so, they clearly caved in to the political pressure." Senator Tom Daschle, the Democratic leader, commented that the decision "smells of intimidation to me.".

PS

My ABC affilate is NOT answering the phones

[jean]

1. your affiliate is not answering? How about calling their direct competitor

and reporting the story?

[Ignacio Upton]

2. I don't remember hearing about this movie

Until last week. I bet ABC purposely started promoting it late to limit our ability to mobalize against it. If CBS had started promoting The Reagans later, it might have actually aired.

[Hugin]

3. Hmm... The New York Times.

Remind me again why that's a good newspaper?

[otohara]

4. NYT's ???

the link was to an AP story

[Hugin]

5. "by the New York Times and the Drudge Report"

They and Drudge leaked the script...

I guess this was back during the Judith Miller period.