Today’s movie is a
drama with a scene that happens on June 13. I hope you will enjoy this film and
watch it tonight.
QUIZ SHOW
Gawky Queens resident Herb Stempel is the reigning champ on Twenty-One, a TV game show, but the ratings have “plateaued”, so the producers
want a change to shake things up. Charles Van Doren a handsome, Columbia
literature professor applies to be a contestant on the show. The producers try
to talk him into agreeing to cheat in order to beat Stempel, but he refuses.
Richard Goodwin is an attorney for a Congressional committee, but sees the job
as a dead end. The producers tell
Stempel he must “take a dive” and he agrees if he can stay on TV in some
fashion. Stempel loses, missing an easy question, while Van Doren wins with a
question that he had already knew the answer to. Ratings soar as Van Doren is
fed the questions and answers. When Herb’s calls to the producers are ignored
he goes to the state attorney general and a grand jury is convened. Goodwin
hears about this and thinks investigating the quiz shows could lead to
advancement. Goodwin meet Stempel and Van Doren, even attending the birthday
party of Mark Van Doren, Charles’s father on June 13, 1957 [58:49 to
1:06:21].Van Doren finally loses on Twenty-One, but is hired for the Today
show. Goodwin finally gets solid evidence that contestants were given the
answers on Twenty-One from a contestant who sent himself a registered
letter with the answers to the questions he was asked two days before he was on
the show. When Stempel testifies in front of the Congressional committee, he
implicates Van Doren, which no one professes to believe. NBC wants Van Doreen
to issue a statement that he’s innocent. Goodwin had told Van Doren that as
long as he made no statement about the show he would not be called by the
committee. The president of NBC and
Geritol, the show’s sponsor deny knowing anything about a ‘fix”. Van Doren
issues a statement that says he’s innocent, but finally tells his dad he is
guilty. When he testifies before Congress, Van Doren confesses he was given the
answers and loses his jobs at the Today show and Columbia. The shows
producer Enright takes the fall for NBC and Geritol.
A slow-paced and thoughtful
movie. It tries to explain why the characters acted the way they did. It does
take major liberties with the course and scope of the investigation.
Current Biography ed. By Maxine Block (The W. H.
Wilson Company, New York, 1940) at page 824 gives Mark Van Doren’s birthday.
Awards – The film was nominated for the Best Picture, Best
Director, Best Supporting
Actor (Scofield) and Best Adapted Screenplay Oscars at the
67th Academy Awards.
Producers - Robert Redford,
Michael Jacobs, Julian Krainin and Michael Nozik
Director - Robert Redford
Screenplay - Paul Attanasio
Runtime - 2
hours 13 minutes
Released - September
14, 1994
Starring –
John Turturro as Herb Stempel
Rob Morrow as "Dick" Goodwin
Ralph Fiennes as Charles Van Doren
Paul Scofield as Mark Van Doren
Mira Sorvino as Sandra Goodwin
David Paymer as Dan Enright
Hank Azaria as
Albert Freedman
Copyright by Ivan Walters 2014.
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