Tag Archives: Kathy Scruggs

Storytelling and Richard Jewell (2019)

I’m a big fan of Clint Eastwood.

I suspect if I were to do a detailed count of the many movies I have in my collection, either physical copies or digital, movies either featuring Clint Eastwood and/or were directed by him likely makes up a larger count than another other actor out there.

I loved him in the “Dollars/Man With No Name” Trilogy. I loved him in the Dirty Harry films (though the first one is clearly the best, with the others varying in quality). I loved him in quirky films like Play Misty For Me (the first film he actually directed. He was also the movie’s star). I loved him in High Plains Drifter, The Gauntlet, The Eiger Sanction, Unforgiven, etc. etc. etc.

Sure, he’s had his clunkers (Pink Cadillac was an absolute chore to sit through), but by and large I like his movies, whether he acts in them or serves only as director.

Released this past week, Richard Jewell is the latest of Clint Eastwood’s films. He served solely as director and the film, alas, looks to be a box office bomb (no pun intended!).

It would appear people aren’t terribly interested in seeing this film, which chronicles the real life Richard Jewell, who was a security guard who discovered a bomb planted in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics and likely saved the lives of hundreds of people with this discovery… only to become vilified when he it was revealed he was suspected of being the person who planted the bomb to begin with and remained a suspect until the true culprit was found.

Now, reading the above paragraph, I must say: That’s actually a pretty good hook for a based on true life film. A man who goes from hero to villain, only to be absolved when the real person behind the bomb was discovered and arrested.

However…

The film arrived under a cloud of its own controversy, specifically in the way it depicted one of the real-life people involved in this affair: Journalist Kathy Scruggs. From what I’ve read, Kathy Scruggs was a real life character, a hard charging journalist who worked for an Atlanta newspaper and was known to work hard to get her stories. At the time, she was supposedly dating a member of the Atlanta Police Department who tipped her off that the FBI was suspicious of Mr. Jewell. She made inquiries to the FBI and eventually verified this fact and wrote an article (she was co-writer) regarding the fact that Mr. Jewell was now a suspect in the aborted bombing. Her article was the first to finger Mr. Jewell as a suspect and, subsequently, the other news media latched onto the story and made his life a living hell.

In the movie director Clint Eastwood and writer Billy Ray make some curious -terrible- changes to Ms. Scruggs’ story. In the movie, she meets up with Tom Shaw, the FBI agent played by John Hamm, who is investigating/suspecting Jewell of being the bomber. In a now very controversial scene in the film, Scruggs essentially trades sex with Shaw for information regarding Jewell.

That change in the real life story is odious, IMHO. I mean, wasn’t the whole point of this film to show how the media tarred an innocent person? So in clearing him they decide to tar another person as a slut who gets information by trading for sex. Even worse: They tar a person who, if you step back and look at the facts of the case, was simply doing her job as a journalist.

Ms. Scruggs was not the one to suspect Mr. Jewell, it was the FBI. She reported on the fact. Ms. Scruggs, in real life, got a tip and followed up on it. She corroborated the information and then wrote an article about her findings. Editors in the newspaper, one would think, considered the story before approving and publishing it.

While the article certainly proved horrible for Mr. Jewell, did she not do what a journalist should do? Did she not pursue a lead and verify it before writing about it?

And consider this: Ms. Scruggs wasn’t the first person to hear that Mr. Jewell was a suspect. CNN supposedly heard the rumor as well. If Ms. Scruggs article hadn’t been published, how long do you think it would have taken before this information would have made its way to the public anyway?

I strongly suspect it wouldn’t have taken all that long.

I haven’t seen the film but many of the people who have -even those who very much like it- point out the portrayal of Ms. Scruggs and Mr. Hamm’s FBI agent are the film’s biggest liabilities, that they are portrayed as cliched bad guys who are only missing long mustaches they can twirl while they go about their bad guy business.

But, incredibly, it gets worse.

Not only does the film incorrectly depict Ms. Scruggs as trading sex for information, but Tom Shaw, the FBI agent played by Mr. Hamm whom she trades sex for information, is a fictitious construct.

Let that sink in!

There is NO Tom Shaw who worked in the FBI at the time of the Atlanta Bombing. There never was. So not only is the story of Ms. Scruggs trading sex for information bogus, the person she supposedly slept with to get the information doesn’t even exist!

The word comes back to me: Odious.

Yeah, what happened to Richard Jewell was absolutely terrible. He should not have gone through that scrutiny and the accusations.

But you know what? Making alternate -and also terrible- accusations about a real life person in Ms. Scruggs is, in my opinion, just as bad.

Ms. Scruggs passed away at the very young age of 42 in 2001, the result of an overdose of prescription pills. Was it an accidental overdose or suicide? The coroner could not determine. It was reported the Jewell article affected her deeply and she spent the rest of her years regretting what Mr. Jewell went through and her responsibility in the situation. Truly it seems like she cared deeply about her role in this affair.

The sad thing is that it seems to me there is a legitimately good story here which could -and should- have been presented without tarring this woman as some kind of bad guy involved in a fictional affair with a fictional character.

It reeks of Eastwood and company putting the thumbs on the scale, of kicking someone because you have to have villains in your story.

A shame.

If you want to read a good article concerning this controversy, check out Julie Miller’s article presented on VanityFair.com…

The Richard Jewell Controversy – and the complicated truth about Kathy Scruggs