Why Liberal Hollywood Poisoned 'The Reagans'




Amid all the hullabaloo about CBS's decision to demote "The Reagans" to
the cable channel Showtime, a lot of people didn't notice the
fascinating reason the miniseries evolved into such a venomous hatchet
job: Tinseltown's abhorrence of the decent and the normal.

Why Liberal Hollywood Poisoned 'The Reagans'




Amid all the hullabaloo about CBS's decision to demote "The Reagans" to the
cable channel Showtime, a lot of people didn't notice the fascinating reason
the miniseries evolved into such a venomous hatchet job: Tinseltown's
abhorrence of the decent and the normal.

Producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron initially brought the project to ABC,
which enjoyed hits with their musical version of "Cinderella" and their
movie about Judy Garland.

But ABC rejected "The Reagans" because an early version "was very soft; it
was not controversial in the least," one network executive was quoted as
saying.

Yes, the media bigwigs couldn't stand to run anything positive or even
neutral about the Republican icon. Time to bring out the arsenic.

CBS bought the $16 million production only after the filmmakers made it
NASTY enough.

When the network announced it would air "The Reagans," it deliberately lied
in describing the program as a love story between Ronald and Nancy.

NewsMax was the first to point out, many months ago, that the film was set
to be a hatchet job on Reagan. We knew that when the producers openly talked
that the movie would delve into the Reagans' "troubled" relations with their
children.

Those of us who eventually saw the promotional video and read the leaked
excerpts of the script know that the schlockumentary is the opposite of a
love story. It's all about La-La Land's hatred of anyone with a differing
viewpoint.

According to the New York Times, "one executive involved in the production
said the producers had made it clear in several meetings they were aiming to
produce a highly controversial film. That was also the message they conveyed
in an article in The New York Times on Oct. 21, that for the first time
provided details about the portrayal of the Reagans, and that alerted
conservative backers of the former president that the film was not going to
be entirely sympathetic."

Note to the Times: If you want to be accurate, try changing "entirely
sympathetic" to "at all sympathetic."

We have to give the Times' critic Alessandra Stanley credit, though, for
noting that the "producers appear to have sacrificed showmanship to
self-righteousness, adopting a preachy, liberal agenda.... Rather than
treading lightly, the stars gloated about how controversial their film would
be. James Brolin said his portrayal of Mr. Reagan was partly inspired by the
Reagan puppet on the British satirical show 'Spitting Image.' Judy Davis,
who plays Nancy Reagan, pompously said she hoped the film would teach
Americans to scrutinize their elected leaders more carefully."

"Handled more delicately, the series could have been shown on CBS," Stanley
wrote. "The eight-minute trailer that CBS sent out ... suggests that the
movie is bad history and good television."

In particular she faulted the partisan but usually talented Davis for
abandoning all nuance and portraying Mrs. Reagan as a monster.

As for Malibu Barbi Streisand, Little Tommy Daschle and the other Democrats
crying foul about CBS's decision, let's see if they would object to a
pseudo-biopic in which Bill Clinton is falsely quoted as calling himself
"the Antichrist" and saying that AIDS patients deserve to "die in sin."

That we'll never know, because Democrat-run Hollywood, of course, would
never invent such lies about its fallen idol.

Plenty of NewsMax readers wrote in to put the issue in perspective. Rich
Engle of Elk Grove, California put it best: "The liberals who are crying
foul on cancellation of CBS's hack job of President Ronald Reagan are truly
out in left field. The U.S. Constitution's First Amendment right of free
speech has no bearing on this case. No government agency demanded the
cancellation of the program, popular opinion did. The fact is that the
producers made a poor quality product, and consumers rejected it. Citizens
of the United States of America have conducted business in this manner for
well over two hundred years with unequaled success."

Newsmax: Sticking it to the left.

Why Liberal Hollywood Poisoned 'The Reagans'




Amid all the hullabaloo about CBS's decision to demote "The Reagans" to the
cable channel Showtime, a lot of people didn't notice the fascinating reason
the miniseries evolved into such a venomous hatchet job: Tinseltown's
abhorrence of the decent and the normal.

Producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron initially brought the project to ABC,
which enjoyed hits with their musical version of "Cinderella" and their
movie about Judy Garland.

But ABC rejected "The Reagans" because an early version "was very soft; it
was not controversial in the least," one network executive was quoted as
saying.

Yes, the media bigwigs couldn't stand to run anything positive or even
neutral about the Republican icon. Time to bring out the arsenic.

CBS bought the $16 million production only after the filmmakers made it
NASTY enough.

When the network announced it would air "The Reagans," it deliberately lied
in describing the program as a love story between Ronald and Nancy.

NewsMax was the first to point out, many months ago, that the film was set
to be a hatchet job on Reagan. We knew that when the producers openly talked
that the movie would delve into the Reagans' "troubled" relations with their
children.

Those of us who eventually saw the promotional video and read the leaked
excerpts of the script know that the schlockumentary is the opposite of a
love story. It's all about La-La Land's hatred of anyone with a differing
viewpoint.

According to the New York Times, "one executive involved in the production
said the producers had made it clear in several meetings they were aiming to
produce a highly controversial film. That was also the message they conveyed
in an article in The New York Times on Oct. 21, that for the first time
provided details about the portrayal of the Reagans, and that alerted
conservative backers of the former president that the film was not going to
be entirely sympathetic."

Note to the Times: If you want to be accurate, try changing "entirely
sympathetic" to "at all sympathetic."

We have to give the Times' critic Alessandra Stanley credit, though, for
noting that the "producers appear to have sacrificed showmanship to
self-righteousness, adopting a preachy, liberal agenda.... Rather than
treading lightly, the stars gloated about how controversial their film would
be. James Brolin said his portrayal of Mr. Reagan was partly inspired by the
Reagan puppet on the British satirical show 'Spitting Image.' Judy Davis,
who plays Nancy Reagan, pompously said she hoped the film would teach
Americans to scrutinize their elected leaders more carefully."

"Handled more delicately, the series could have been shown on CBS," Stanley
wrote. "The eight-minute trailer that CBS sent out ... suggests that the
movie is bad history and good television."

In particular she faulted the partisan but usually talented Davis for
abandoning all nuance and portraying Mrs. Reagan as a monster.

As for Malibu Barbi Streisand, Little Tommy Daschle and the other Democrats
crying foul about CBS's decision, let's see if they would object to a
pseudo-biopic in which Bill Clinton is falsely quoted as calling himself
"the Antichrist" and saying that AIDS patients deserve to "die in sin."

That we'll never know, because Democrat-run Hollywood, of course, would
never invent such lies about its fallen idol.

Plenty of NewsMax readers wrote in to put the issue in perspective. Rich
Engle of Elk Grove, California put it best: "The liberals who are crying
foul on cancellation of CBS's hack job of President Ronald Reagan are truly
out in left field. The U.S. Constitution's First Amendment right of free
speech has no bearing on this case. No government agency demanded the
cancellation of the program, popular opinion did. The fact is that the
producers made a poor quality product, and consumers rejected it. Citizens
of the United States of America have conducted business in this manner for
well over two hundred years with unequaled success."

Newsmax: Sticking it to the left.