THE NEW REPUBLIC and its editor-in-chief Marty Peretz, along with Lions Gate Films, hosted a screening of the new movie “Shattered Glass” in Washington Thursday night. Afterwards, Peretz, Peter Beinart, the magazine’s present editor, Leon Wieseltier, the magazine’s longtime literary editor, and the film’s screenwriter and director, Billy Ray, answered questions from an audience of friends and colleagues concerning the film’s depiction of the Stephen Glass scandal that rocked the magazine in May of 1998. The first comments concerned the fact-checking processes in operation during Glass’s tenure at the New Republic. Ray commented that the system was not designed to guard against fraud, but to verify facts reported in good faith. “I think we’re letting ourselves off the hook,” said Peretz. “Years ago, my wife said to me, ‘I’m not reading Stephen Glass anymore.'” The details of Glass’s reporting, related Peretz, were “too cute” for his wife to believe. Peretz cited the particularly novelistic example of portable urinals mentioned by Glass in one article, which the young reporter wrote were used by police officers working their beat. “I think if you go through all the stories from beginning to end,” said Peretz, “you will find a medley of assertions that defy the imagination.”

“I’m embarrassed,” admitted Peretz, “because I laughed with everybody else when there was an altar to George H.W. Bush” in one of Glass’s stories. People building shrines to their favorite political and business leaders (Alan Greenspan, Paul Tsongas) were in fact a recurring motif in Glass’s reportage.