Truth is better than fiction
The mastermind behind the Frost-Nixon interviews was in Washington Friday to discuss his new book, “The Conviction of Richard Nixon: The Untold Story of the Frost/Nixon Interviews” — and share details that screeners of current Oscar-nominated film might have missed.
James Reston Jr. headed most of the research conducted for the 1977 interview—serving as the British host’s Watergate advisor—for which Nixon was paid an “outrageous” $1 million. Reston admitted to a Capitol Hill audience that along with the money, Nixon most likely agreed to the interview for “he surely thought David Frost was a soft touch.” Reston agreed, but added that though “Frost had a lot of weaknesses … we were fortunate that in the 11th hour he really did his homework.”
Reston, played by Sam Rockwell in the film, attempted to link the definitive presidency to a more recent one. “The actions of Nixon seem trivial to those of Bush in the last eight years to the college generation,” he said. “Perhaps we need a cathartic, definitive bookend to the Bush era” (a “Frost/Bush,” maybe?).
When asked about the scene in “Frost/Nixon” in which Reston refuses to shake hands with Nixon but later crumbles under the pressure, Reston chuckled, “I suppose there’s some truth to that. I love the sappy parts.”
