Peter Landesman wrote and directed “Mark Felt: The Man Who Brought Down the White House” with Liam Neeson as the man who was in the number two position at the FBI during the Nixon years and who was revealed, more than thirty years later, to be “Deep Throat,” the source of critical information about Watergate and its investigation and cover-up to Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein. Told from Felt’s point of view, this is very different from the portrayal by Hal Holbrook in the Oscar-winning “All the President’s Men. In an interview, Landesman talked about patriotism, secrets, and the turning point in Watergate.
Deep Throat’s most memorable line in “All the President’s Men” is “Follow the money.” Why doesn’t he say that in your movie?
Well, he never said, “Follow the money.” It was a construction of William Goldman who wrote the screenplay. Bob and Carl are very open about that being made up. That screenplay and that film are as good as anything ever made but they are not the truth and they all know it and we all know it. It is a great film and it has become the known history, but it’s not what happened.
There are two issues; one is Bob and Carl whom I respect and I think we can call each other friends; they see Watergate through their own keyhole as everybody does when you have a subjective point of view. You see what you see mediated by your own agenda, by your own desires, by your own egos, by your own information, and the truth is there were at least four reporters who Felt was manipulating and giving information to, maybe more but I know four. Bob was just one and Bob was a rookie. I think that Felt’s most important relationship was with Sandy Smith at Time Magazine who really delivered two or three of the biggest most important blows only one of which was really visible.
And what were those?
One was within a couple days of the break-in. [Acting FBI Director] Pat Gray at the behest of Nixon ordered Felt to shut down the investigation after 48 hours. That's in the film. In the history of the FBI the bureau had never been asked to or forced to shut down any investigation at any time until it was finished. As we see in the film, Felt told Smith, Smith called Gray and said he heard that this had happened and Gray freaked out and relented, allowing the investigation to continue. Smith didn’t write about it but it was Smith’s phone call to Gray that allowed the investigation to continue and had that not happened they may not have ever gotten anywhere.
At the very end of the film after it looked like Felt had truly lost and Nixon had won, when it looked like Watergate was going nowhere, Gray was going for his confirmation hearing to be FBI director. Probably Felt set him up with the wiretap story and he knew that Gray would fall and give up John Dean. It was really kind of a brilliant piece of misdirection because he took down Nixon over Watergate using something that had nothing to do with Watergate but using Pat Gray who was Nixon's tool; it was really a kind of genius frankly and that was all Smith.
How did Felt decide what to tell Woodward?
He would do it in dribs and drabs to allow the reporters to hopefully get or arrive somewhere on their own. There’s the big meeting in the garage that's depicted in my film and also in “All the President's Men,” where it is more truncated. He really let it all out because it was October 9th, less than a month before the election. He was running out of time. That article appeared the morning of October 10th and it was the big bomb; the big drop. It was about how the FBI knew about the White House corruption, including the dirty tricks campaign. Once that article came out, that was the last genie out of the bottle and it couldn’t go back. It still took a year and a half for him to resign, that was the beginning of the end.
Would you describe Felt as a patriot?
Yes, he did what he did to protect the FBI from the corruption of the Nixon administration, Nixon ultimately wanted Bill Sullivan to go back into the director's seat though Sullivan was a dirty scoundrel.
But he says he wants to protect the FBI; he does not say he wants to protect the Constitution or Americans. And he was found guilty of illegal wiretapping.
I personally have no problem with surveillance legal or illegal. If someone wants to listen to my conversations they're welcome to. I've got nothing to hide. It all depends on who is in control; I believe in the Philosopher King. I believe if the right man is in the chair making decisions that stray uncomfortably close to the edge of the Constitution I feel comfortable enough to sleep at night.
I don't think that Snow or Assange are in the same category. I think that they are narcissists. There's a difference between a whistleblower and a purveyor of chaos.
So patriotism is a funny word. There are a lot of people who call Donald Trump a patriot because he talks about the founding fathers and wears red, white and blue. There's a difference between patriotism and jingoism. Felt is a remarkable patriot and he was a soldier for the people. He gained nothing from it. The true measure of philanthropy is when someone builds a hospital and does not put his name on it. Felt didn’t want credit. He didn't talk about it, he wished probably he went to his grave without talking about it. I don't know any other better measure of patriotism than that.