They star in The Post, Spielberg's film about the newspaper's decision to publish secret documents about the Vietnam War.
The Post: Dark Secrets of the Pentagon recounts the tense days in 1971 that led to The Washington Post's decision to publish the Pentagon Papers, the government's secret history of the Vietnam War. The New York Times had broken the story but was barred from publishing all the documents after the Nixon administration won an injunction in court. That's when The Post picked up the story.
Steven Spielberg is directing the film, which stars Meryl Streep as Katharine Graham - the editor of The Post, who was recognized for defying pressure from President Richard M. Nixon - and Tom Hanks as legendary editor Ben Bradlee. It is also the first time that these three Hollywood icons have worked together. Hanks and Streep talk about the film's disturbing similarities to today, what they think of the Weinstein case, and what it's like to follow in the footsteps of arguably the greatest journalism movie in history, All the President's Men (1976). . Directed by Alan Pakula, starring Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman as Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, it told behind the scenes of the publication of the Watergate scandal, which ended with the resignation of President Nixon. And it had Jason Robards in the role of Bradlee.
-Did any of you start filming thinking: “The best movie about The Washington Post has already been made, is that what we are facing?”?
-Streep: I did not think that the best film about The Washington Post had already been made. It was a great movie, but they forgot to mention Katharine Graham and her lead role. They alluded to her sideways.
-Hanks: They refer to her only once.
-Especially you, Tom, who accepted a role that had already been played iconic: how did you approach it differently?
-Hanks: I considered this to be the story of the week that Katharine Graham became Katharine Graham. I play the juicy role of the only ally she had. Philosophically, the relationship they had was based on many things. We could call it love, respect, empathy, understanding, professional determination.
-Streep: Mutual admiration.
-Hanks: It was also a strained relationship, like when he told her: "Katharine, don't put your finger on my sore spot." From the moment we read it and said “I'm not going to let this get away from me”, it became part of the details of what the Pentagon Papers were. That actually bolstered the story of the week Katharine Graham became Katharine Graham.
-She was full of insecurity, that haunted her all her life. She felt that she was in a holding pattern until her son was old enough to become the editor. Where do you think she found her courage to say, "Let's do it, let's publish it"? Her advisers disagreed.
-Streep: Where do the most difficult things come from? They come from deep inside. They usually come from your parents. Her father was a formidable character and her mother was even more important in her life. She was absent, but that absence was important. Katharine Graham was a product of her time. It was the whole culture that undermined women, especially those who could have had more agency: wealthy, highly educated women with all the opportunities to take on important positions in life, but who were left behind. The more he read about her, the more he thought, "Who do you think you're trying to be...Katharine Graham?" She was highly thoughtful, principled, and cunning in the way that women should be when they were considered socially secondary.
-Hanks: There is also that scene where the men stay to talk about politics and current events, and the women go to another room.
-I didn't know that this still happened in the early '70s.
-Streep: You must remember that I was already in graduate school when I was first allowed to have a credit card without a male relative signing for me.
-The film is a model for men and women who work together respectfully, which - who would have thought? - is what we need: that good example.
-Streep: Yes, but imagine that I had been the general editor of The Washington Post, you [Hanks] would have been my boss and I said: "Don't stick your finger in it."
-Hanks: They would have said you were a bitch.
-Streep: I would have been fired. And that's what I mean by lack of balance. There is tolerance for some things. I think that women also have to raise their voice and be able to do something like that.
-There are echoes of Nixon in what the White House is saying right now; the difference is that whoever is in charge in the White House is saying that true journalism produces fake news. Was it rewarding to make a film set when people actually believed the news?
Hanks: The attack on the First Amendment under the Nixon administration was old school. It was like D-Day of the excuse “let's stop this news because it's about national security and they're traitors if they publish it. Because if they dare to publish it, they will know that we lie. And if they know we're lying, we can't do our job." What is happening today is that guerrilla against the First Amendment. It is the idea that now several people in high command of the current administration have expressed verbally, that "alternative facts" exist. It validates what is obviously false, what the communicators themselves know to be false and, worse yet, know to be unconfirmed and crude. And in that reality almost the same message arrives: "Don't let them find out the truth because, if they do, we won't be able to stay in power." All the things that were happening did not go unnoticed by any of us.
How can we have faith in those institutions again?
-Hanks: It's a marathon; it is a long-winded race. But in the end the truth comes out.
-At The New York Times, colleagues feel that this was a Times story, because they revealed the Pentagon Papers. What do you think of that?
-Hanks: I read an article before we started filming. It's called "How dare they make this movie about The Washington Post when it was us?" We are all reacting to what The New York Times did. They didn't have Katharine Graham. They didn't have that aspect of the story. The Times has all the recognition in the world. Let your colleagues know that you appreciate them a lot.
