I finally ran down the story on the Oliver Stone Movie, "The Day Reagan was shot. It was made for Showtime. The message is, "If you want to watch fiction from Stone, fine, but don't believe a word of it as truth."
Oliver Stone, Al Haig and 'The Day Reagan Was Shot'
Christopher Ruddy
Wednesday, Dec. 19, 2001
Last weekend I watched, with some degree of shock, "The Day Reagan Was Shot," the new cable film produced by Oliver Stone and directed by Cyrus Nowrasteh.
The Showtime film was particularly jarring because I know the main character, Gen. Alexander Haig (portrayed by Richard Dreyfuss), who was Secretary of State on March 30, 1981, the day John Hinckley shot President Reagan.
Earlier that same week I had bumped into noted director Stone in New York, and when I mentioned that I knew Haig, Stone told me he and Richard Dreyfuss thought Haig was a "hero" for his actions that day.
At that point I had not seen the film, and Stone mentioned it would air repeatedly over the next few weeks.
So I looked forward to seeing it.
After seeing the film last Saturday, I must say the made-for-cable movie cannot even be described as historical docudrama, with the dramatic license that may involve.
Instead, I felt as if I were watching Saturday Night Live ? especially since I know several of the people portrayed in the movie and know there is no match between them and the Hollywood make-believe.
What was really discomforting was my search of new reports about the movie on Lexis-Nexis. Incredibly, many newspapers were covering the movie as if it was a documentary that actually broke news.
Here are just some "news" headlines about the film:
"Day Reagan Was Shot" Scary, Surprising ? San Francisco Chronicle
A National Crisis We Knew Nothing About ? Los Angeles Daily News
"Day Reagan Was Shot" Puts Spotlight on Chaotic Scene ? Boston Herald
Nobody Was in Control ? Hartford Courant
Shedding Light on a Dark Day ? Boston Globe
When a Wounded President Was Closer to Death than People Knew ? New York Times
Get the picture? Oliver Stone produces a film with little basis in truth or fact, and it's reported as history by major newspapers!
Stone has many critics of his films, including "Nixon" and "JFK." I wasn't so offended by them. In each Stone was offering a point of view and interpretation ? and most people understood that. In fact, newspapers treated the films that way ? and made no claims of historical accuracy.
But "The Day Reagan Was Shot" was presented differently by the producers and has been treated differently by the press. Thus, its mistruths are more dangerous.
The film is grossly and blatantly unfair to Al Haig, a patriotic soldier who saw combat in Korea and went on to serve on the staff of Gen. MacArthur, as a decorated commander in Vietnam, and as supreme commander of NATO.
But the portrayal of Haig is quite different from the brave and committed public servant he has been. It paints a picture of a megalomaniacal secretary of state trying to engage in a coup on the day Reagan was shot.
In the movie, Haig tries to invoke the 25th Amendment to take presidential power away from President Reagan.
As Reagan lay near death, the movie says Haig was desperately trying to gain control of the president's "football" nuclear codes as he pushed America to the brink of nuclear Armageddon ? all the while ranting and raving in the White House's secure Situation Room command center, slapping the face of a top aide, popping pills and wagging his finger at other Cabinet members.
Of course, none of this happened.
Even Haig's critics and detractors in the Reagan administration never made such claims about him.
But other irrefutable evidence reveals that "The Day Reagan was Shot" is a comedy with almost no basis in fact.
In March of this year, Reagan National Security Council Advisor Richard Allen released transcripts of tape recordings he made in the Situation Room on the day Reagan was shot.
I have read those transcripts and have written about them earlier this year (See Haig Was Right .) They are remarkable on several counts, but perhaps most importantly, they support Haig's account of what transpired that fateful day.
As Haig has told the story, and the tapes confirm, the real worry among top officials that day was that the assassination attempt on Reagan might spark a chain reaction of unintended consequences that would lead the Russians to panic and begin a war.
The tapes prove that was Haig's paramount concern, and he wanted to make sure the U.S. government did not begin raising its military alert status without provocation, so as not to alarm the Russians.
But a real problem did arise that day.
While Haig told the White House press that the U.S. government did not see the assassination as an act of war and was not increasing the military's alert status, this was not really true.
Unknown to Haig and almost every top official in the U.S. government, the inexperienced Secretary of Defense, Caspar Weinberger, without consulting other members of the government assembled in the Situation Room, was raising the alert.
In fact, Weinberger ordered SAC bomber pilots into their cockpits and their engines fired up (this step is consistent with the Pentagon's second-highest alert status) at the very same time Haig was telling the Russians our forces were not on alert.
The tension that day in the Situation Room ? and the danger that existed ? involved Weinberger's failure to inform everyone he had raised the alert status.
The transcripts show Weinberger later claimed he had not really increased the alert, even after sending the pilots into their cockpits.
On this point of friction, Al Haig was on side of calm, proper disclosure and good sense. The tapes show it.
Even Richard Allen says the movie has little basis in fact, and was astounded that director Nowrasteh claimed the tapes "corroborate our movie." Allen responded emphatically, "They do no such thing."
Outside the Situation Room, the wounded president was shown as an airhead actor and his wife, Nancy, as a manipulative, emotional basket case.
Nowrasteh told the New York Times critic, "I've really come to respect President Reagan and Nancy Reagan enormously, and I hope the movie shows that."
Who is Nowrasteh kidding?
Even the sympathetic New York Times critic found Nowrasteh's comment ludicrous, writing, "You have to assume it's inadvertent, then, that this muddled film reinforces the image of Ronald Reagan as the president in the empty suit."
So it may make you wonder that, after doing a hit job on Al Haig, the Reagans and the rest of the Reagan administration, there is talk of "heroes" and "enormous respect" from the film's producer and director.
Here's why Stone and Nowrasteh are giving mixed signals: They got caught.
A look at the timeline shows that the movie was filmed in January and February of 2001. At that time neither Stone nor Nowrasteh knew that Allen had taped the activities of the Situation Room that day.
When Allen released the transcripts in March, it must have come as a bit of a shock to Stone, Nowrasteh and Dreyfuss. Their story line was already filmed, but the tapes totally demolished their claims.
It was too late to change the script and too late to pull the plug on the film they had just spent almost $5 million shooting.
That's probably why there has been a lot of fluffy spin about the Reagans and Haig ? though the film paints a horrible picture of them.
Decency might suggest that Stone and Nowrasteh put a disclaimer at the beginning and end of their film stating "The Day Reagan Was Shot" was not a dramatic recreation of historical events, but simply a fictional account of what may have happened on the day Reagan was shot ? what might have happened if calm and experienced officials like Al Haig were not on duty at the White House the day Reagan was shot.
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