New film: LBJ

[Martin White]

Thankfully, we will not get the Nelson/McClellan version. I mean those two books relied on so many unreliable sources.

But from what I understand, we will not even get the Dallek/Caro version.

Its supposed to be even softer than that.

And Harrelson as LBJ? I have never imagined him as a character actor at all.

Of the movies I've seen, the portrayal of LBJ likely (in my opinion) to be the most accurate was the one by Liev Schreiber in The Butler. Cussing out and abusing his staff and talking to them whilst on the toilet. Coarse to the end.

And this link shows us that Jim was right about how soft the new movie is going to be.
http://deadline.com/2015/06/woody-harrel...201445688/

Looks like no mention of the corruption, vote rigging, intimidation and (perhaps) murder that a) got him where he ended up and b) kept him out of jail.

Jim D - Do you know anything about the scriptwriter Joey Hartstone?

This is director Rob Reiner summing up....

"During the sixties, I was a hippy and Lyndon Johnson was my president. At the time LBJ was the target of most of my generation's anti-Vietnam-War anger. But as time has passed and my understanding of political realities has grown; I've come to see LBJ in a very different light," said Reiner in a statement. "He was a complex man; a combination of brilliant political instinct, raw strength, ambition, and deep insecurities. The strength and power of persuasion that he showed to his colleagues existed alongside of a soft, almost childlike quality that perhaps only Lady Bird got to see. His life's path was nothing short of Shakespearean. From the poor hill country of West Texas to the corridors of power in Washington, he used his brilliant political acumen to pass the most groundbreaking civil rights legislation of the twentieth century. And had it not been for the Vietnam War, I believe he would have gone down as one of America's greatest presidents."