8 Things We Learned from "Spotlight's Real-life Editor Marty Baron
By Maeve McDermott
Before Liev Schreiber donned wire-framed glasses to play Marty Baron in Spotlight, the newspaper editor was already a legend, from spearheading the Boston Globe's investigation of the Catholic Church to winning Pulitzer Prizes at nearly every other paper he's edited, most recently as the executive editor of the Washington Post. On Thursday night, Baron discussed the Oscar-nominated film — that he's seen "eight times," if anyone's counting — in a wide-ranging conversation at American University, discussing everything from the film's impact on abuse survivors and the shocking details uncovered by screenwriters to his opinion of the Revenant. He loves Schreiber's portrayal Baron had nothing but praise for Schreiber, who he'll presumably meet again when they both travel to the Oscars on Sunday. "He's a fantastic actor," he said, joking, "Since the movie came out people say he looks like me." "It's resonated with abuse survivors in an incredible way," Baron said, sharing an anecdote about an 82-year-old man who, after watching Spotlight at a screening, shared his own account of abuse for the first time. "He said he'd tried twice to see this movie and couldn't make it past the parking lot of the theater. He saw it at this screening ... he'd never told anyone, never spoken to anyone about it before. He talked about how it'd stayed with him his entire life. He said, 'All I want to say is thank you,' and that was incredibly moving, and then he walked back to his family. That sort of thing has happened at a lot of events I've been at ... abuse survivors encouraged to come forward and talk about the abuse they suffered." And newspapers who've changed their minds about investigative reporting It's hard to come away from Spotlight and not feel reinvigorated about the role of journalism. Apparently, this extends to journalism execs. "I've heard from publishers saying they are rededicating themselves to investigative reporting," Baron said. The movie's researchers uncovered a major secret, then wrote it into the movie like the Spotlight team had discovered it Baron praised the movie's researchers for being great investigative reporters in their own right, demonstrated by one crucial detail they uncovered. In a pivotal scene, the Spotlight team is confronted with news that the Globe received documents about papal misconduct 20 years before its investigation, writing a small story and burying it deep in the paper. Turns out, this scene actually happened while the movie was filming, after its researchers discovered the story and confronted the Globe editors, who didn't know their predecessors had previously known, and ignored, what would become the paper's flagship story. The scene was written in to look like it was part of the original Spotlight reporting process, when in reality, it was the movie researchers who pulled off the investigation. A popular question posed to Baron—how would Spotlight be different if it happened in 2016? "I don't think in this current environment when things are so competitive we could've sat on that story," he said. In other words, other news organizations would be on their tail as soon as they got a whiff of the story. "Those documents were sitting in a courthouse, it's kind of stunning nobody did." And how has journalism changed since? Baron criticized a decrease in quality journalism from when Spotlight's report was published. "They don't knock on doors! We knocked on doors!" he recalled hearing Bob Woodward complaining about a newer generation of reporters. "In the pressure to publish a lot, we're not always doing real reporting," Baron said. He turned down Showtime's offer to make a Spotlight-esque movie—and they made it anyway "A year or two" after the investigation, the Spotlight team turned down an offer from Showtime to turn their account into a movie. "We were worried that it'd look like we were taking advantage of a very sad story," Baron said, rightly. Eventually, Showtime made the movie, which he described as a "horrible, horrible caricature." "It had me in a meeting getting frustrated — with a cigar and a bow tie — saying something like, 'Would someone tell me what's going on here? I'm just a Jew from Miami!" The Spotlight team was pleased at their representation....well, almost the whole team Baron reported that the Globe staffers were mostly pleased with how they were played in the movie. "There was one reporter portrayed who was not so happy," he said, obviously declining to say who. He's not so keen on Spotlight's main competition "I haven't seen the Revenant," he said. "It's not my kind of movie. My kind of movie is one that has actual characters, real stories that are emblematic of the way life is lived." Read Baron's own take on what it's like seeing himself, and his story, on-screen here.
|
.
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.