Production on Steven Spielberg’s “The Post” began earlier this summer, with the legendary director and his esteemed cast looking to tell the true story of how the Pentagon Papers, a detailed breakdown on the Vietnam War compiled by the United States Department Of Defense between 1945 and 1967, was ultimately published by The New York Times, after an unprecedented battle between journalists and the government.
The reason why Spielberg suddenly decided that the time was nigh to tell the above story, even though the Pentagon Papers were published all the way back in 1971, was because he wanted to address “the importance of vigorous and free press in America,” especially as that has been severely threatened with Donald Trump in The White House.
That’s according to director and producer Susan Lacy, who has created the upcoming HBO documentary “Spielberg”, which takes an intimate and probing look at the career of the filmmaker. During my recent discussion with Lacy regarding her film and the director she turned to the future and outlined why Spielberg wanted to make “The Post” now.
“[Steven] is making a film about the Washington Post publishing the Pentagon Papers. Which is absolutely Steven’s statement about the importance of vigorous and free press in America. Because we have a President that keeps attacking the press.”
I then asked Lacy whether this was something that Spielberg himself had explained to her. “Well, it’s the reason he is making [the film], I mean it is a true story and a historic story, but the reason he chose to make it now is because he feels like it is a message that needs to be out there. I don’t want to speak for him, but I think that’s why he is clearly making this film now.”
Lacy and Spielberg clearly have quite a good friendship, because not only did she repeatedly interview him for her documentary, but she’d even spent some time with the director on the morning of Monday September 25th, shortly before I spoke to her. “I actually saw Steven this morning. I hadn’t seen him in a while, and we’re about to be doing some premieres together, and we just wanted to touch base.”
“The Post” possesses an all-star cast, led by the Oscar winning talent of Tom Hanks and Meryl Streep, while it also features Alison Brie, Sarah Paulson, Carrie Coon, David Cross, Bruce Greenwood, Tracy Letts, Bob Odenkirk, Jesse Plemons, Michael Stuhlberg, Zach Woods, and Bradley Whitford, too. “The Post” will be released on December 22, 2017.
Meanwhile, Susan Lacy’s 150-minute long “Spielberg” will debut on HBO on Saturday October 7th at 8pm ET.
