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Crew member 1: One second, Mike.
Crew member 2: Another ten seconds, we'll do some shooting.
Crew member: Okay.
- We going? - Crew member: We have speed.
Why is the Fox Network increasingly popular?
People in America are desperate for straight talk.
And they're not getting it from the networks?
The networks are too stodgy, too traditional.
You gotta cut through it now.
When I tell people I'm going to do a profile of O'Reilly.
"Oh! Wonderful. Wonderful. Don't let him off the hook.
Go get him. Bring him down. You're the guy who can do it."
What is it about me that offends them?
- Take a look at you. - The O'Reilly Factoris on.
I'm asking you to shut up about sec...
Come on, you coward!
- Say the truth! - What do you mean coward?
See, I'm more angry about it than you are!
Shut up! Shut up! Yeah, you had your 35 minutes.
Shut up!
That's not an interview. That's a lecture.
- You say you're a journalist. - Correct.
I say that you're an op-ed columnist.
- Which is different. - Bill: No, it's not.
You're a dinosaur. You have to engage now.
You have to challenge.
You have to be so provocative.
This is going to embarrass you, Wallace.
So are you ready to be embarrassed?
Playboymagazine wrote that Bill O'Reilly
is the most feared interviewer since Mike Wallace.
You're the driving force behind my career.
I always tell everybody, you got a problem with me?
He's responsible.
So if you don't like me...
you go to Wallace.
[upbeat music playing]
TV host: The mention of my first guest's name
has been known to strike fear
into the hearts of brave men and women.
I'm Mike Wallace. I'm Mike Wallace. I'm Mike Wallace.
- Please welcome Mike Wallace. - [crowd cheering]
TV host: Your image.
Interviewer, journalist, killer. All right?
This man is going to get somebody
and we're going to watch it right here on television.
Do you enjoy "gotcha"?
Stephen Colbert: You are the master of nailing.
You might have even invented nailing somebody on camera
with that last question.
- How many people did you kill? - Five.
But I don't think I can kill an innocent person.
What do you mean by an innocent person?
Well, you're an innocent person.
It may just have been that you were difficult, Bette.
- No, no, no, no. - Not difficult. Impossible.
You're probably unpleasant to him...
You're a son of a bitch. Do you know that?
- Oh, come on. - You're a son of a bitch.
Crew member: Sync.
Interviewer: You go in to cover a story.
It's your camera. It's your microphone.
How would you like that done to you?
How long do you think we'll talk?
Interviewer: How would you like somebody to point a camera at you,
to confront you with embarrassing material
perhaps about a life you once led
- or something you once did? - Well, fine.
But I don't have to answer. I think it's a lousy question.
- Crew member: All set. - You rolling on both?
Interviewer: I mean, does it ever occur to you
that what you're doing is somehow...
It's a little bit brutalizing?
[clock ticking]
How would you like it done to you?
I wouldn't like it.
When was the last time we had lunch together?
Lunch?
Here we are, having ostensibly...
This is the first time I think, Mike.
- both: [chuckles] - I know.
- It's been a long time. - It has been a long time.
Shall we, gentlemen, are we rolling?
- Crew member: We got speed. - Okay.
- This is a Wallace question. - Mm-hmm.
Why are you sometimes such a prick?
Uh...
Why am I sometimes such a prick?
Example?
- Example? - Example.
Your life, Mike, is an example. Come on.
I want to go back to the beginning.
Good evening, I'm Mike Wallace.
A nation's press
is a good yardstick of a nation's health.
Take a look at the history of any nation
which has lost its freedoms
and you'll find that the men who grabbed the power,
also have to crush the free press.
Tonight, we'll discuss some of the problems
of our own fourth estate.
Man: The first kinescope that I can remember saying,
- "Now, that's Mike Wallace," isNight Beat. -Mike: Of course.
Man: How did Night Beatstart
and how did you become Mike Wallace?
Mike: Growing up in Brookline, Massachusetts.
My mother was humorless. Strict.
My father was honest. Very straight forward.
I developed a case of acne as an adolescent,
which I think marked my personality.
Back in those days, I yearned for...
not sunny days, gray days
so that it wouldn't show the pockmarks.
When the sun was there, I suddenly was exposed
in all of my painful ugliness.
Interviewer: It seems like you've always felt
you had something to prove.
As a young man, you said you had acne,
you felt like you've got a face for radio.
- Mike: That's right. - Interviewer: That was something
you had to prove that you were better than.
But you had already started developing this tougher persona.
Mike: I discovered my voice
and that's what saved me.
I thought to myself, I'd be a radio announcer.
There were no pictures.
I could hide behind the microphone.
But I obviously wanted to perform.
Radio Announcer: Right now, here's Mike Wallace.
Mike: Listen Thursday to Sky King.
All of the grocers of America
who sells Peter Pan Peanut Butter
help make this program possible.
This is Mike Wallace up in Sheraton...
Ride with Rip Reed as he races to another thrilling adventure.
The Green Hornet strikes again.
- You were the Green Hornet. - You see, back in those days,
you did the news, you announced dramatic shows
like Green Hornet and Lone Ranger.
And you swept up the studio before you went home.
You did a lot of things in other words.
All right, boys! Let's head out.
Announcer: Ride the rails with Ned Jordan, Secret Agent!
[static buzzing]
Morley Safer: I think that at some point in Mike's life,
he invented a guy called Mike Wallace,
who was gonna be tough as nails,
no nonsense, no-holds-barred,
never took orders from anybody.
[static tune]
Mike: All right! Phew.
Barbra: Oh, you shooting my feet?
- Do I have to put shoes on? - No, leave the shoes off Paul,
and start the interview please.
- They say I'm difficult? - [buzzes]
What are you frightened of?
You know, I was brought up being scared of everything.
You don't go in the water, you'll drown.
You don't stand on your toes as a ballet dancer,
you break your toes.
That's who I am today. In other words,
I'm frightened to death
of directing and producing a movie.
And yet I was always testing the fear.
- Meaning I don't let the fear stop me. - Yup.
But it doesn't mean I'm not frightened
every inch of the way.
I turned on the TV the other day and it went boop,
and there is a man who had written a book
and he's saying "Fear is the energy
behind doing your best work."
Interviewer: You remember the first time you saw a television camera?
Mike: Yes, I was scared to death.
When I first looked up at the lights and the heat,
I figured "I'm never going to be able to make it.
Who's going to wanna look at this man?"
Interviewer: How did you get over it?
Mike: Back in the early days,
television was a kind of experiment.
As a result of which, I was willing to take any job
in television to begin with.
- Announcer: Mike Wallace! - [crowd applauds]
Mike Wallace!
You must let your imagination soar.
If you didn't do it, there's only one way
I can help ya. I've got to know the truth!
Parliament, with its famous high-fi recessed filter
is continually tested for uniformity by the United...
Does that embarrass you, the cigarette commercials,
- for example? - You mean the fact that I...
the fact that I did commercials?
- The acting. - The acting?
Actor, pitch man.
You yourself have a show business background.
Did you ever take acting lessons?
Show business? Oh, you know, this baloney
about a show business background.
What is a show business background?
Well, you were a celebrity yourself.
And you came into the news business later...
- You have no idea... - Not from the journalistic side of things,
from the showbiz side of things.
Hi, I'm Mike Wallace
with a sensational shortening discovery
for better baking and frying.
Oh man, that's some apple pie! Golden Fluffo!
I'm asking you about the acting.
I know you are.
Your welfare doesn't come for a...
Mike: I was a little sensitive
about being a jack of all trades.
But I was searching for something different.
[crowd applauding]
Little did I know that everything
was about to change with my life.
Crew member: Mike Wallace, number four.
Two-two dash one. Take one.
Good evening, I'm Mike Wallace, the show is Night Beat.
What you're about to witness is strictly personal.
A direct, undiluted, unrehearsed,
uncensored interview.
My role is that of a reporter.
Up to then, interviews had been vapid.
Who was the most interesting person you've ever painted?
Senator, I understand that you had a lot of tea parties
during your campaign. Can you still drink tea?
Rod, I've watched your show many times
and I want to tell you it's wonderful.
Mike: And then I wrote and then I sang and so forth.
And no one ever confronted anybody with anything
beyond that kind of talk.
And we said, "Let's do some research about these people
and ask questions that have never been asked before."
Mike: I think that you'll agree that you have a rather
remarkable record for being called names.
- That's right. - Mike: [sniffles]
President Roosevelt once called you a chronic liar.
President Truman called you an SOB at one time
and a vicious liar at another time.
The late Tennessee Senator, Kenneth McKellar
called you an "ignorant liar, a pusillanimous liar,
a peewee liar, a liar in the daytime
and a liar in the nighttime." End quote.
What is there about Drew Pearson that inspires such bitterness?
Well, Mike... [clears throat]
...I can't give an objective answer on that.
Could it be that you're a liar?
People didn't ask tough questions back then.
I mean, you invented that genre.
You're not answering the specific question
that I put, now you know as well as I...
Interviewer: Night Beat was news. It was journalism
but it was also television.
-Mike: Yeah. - Interviewer: It was also dramatic.
Tight close ups, every little tick
and almost like a police investigation.
- Well, you're talking about economic equality. - No I'm talking...
What I'm talking about is social equality.
Now I'm getting to that!
Larry: We're in the same profession.
Mike: Bet your sweet ass.
Crew member: Rolling. Okay, roll one.
Take the camera left.
Take 90. Slate.
- Nervous? - No.
Not at all? People say you're a patsy.
- Oh that's not... - That's the rap.
- Yeah, I know. - I don't think you're a patsy.
You get information your way. I get information my way.
But the rap on King is that he's a patsy.
He will never ask a hard question.
I'm Larry. I'm Larry of the corner.
And when we were on the corner
I was the kind of kid who used to say,
"Why do you want to drive the bus?"
But, wait a second. Why do you want to drive a bus?
Why do you put your hand in the coin box
and take out one out of every three quarters...
- Now, you would ask it that way... - ...Mr. Bus Driver?
...and I would say, "Aren't there temptations?"
And he would say, "Temptations? No."
- What I would not do because it's not my style... - Yeah.
- ...is say, "You've taken quarters!" - [chuckles]
Now, okay, there's no perfect interview.
Don't confuse anger and hostility
with an insistence on getting to the bottom line.
To the fact.
There will be some, I'm sure, who will feel it is a mistake
to give network exposure to Eldon Edwards,
the Imperial Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan.
To you who feel that way, I respect your views,
although I do not share them.
This will be an unrehearsed interview with Eldon Edwards.
I don't know what he will say.
Mr. Edwards, you say that the Klan reject violence?
It does.
Your own Grand Dragon
is quoted having said not once, but many times,
"Negroes who try to force their way into our white schools
are not looking for an education.
They're looking for a funeral."
Well, I didn't hear him say that.
Then how do you account for a report like this.
"Armed, robed and masked men
pulled cripple from home near Negro area.
Character assassination, boycotts, open warnings,
anonymous telephone calls, threatening letters."
Do you employ those techniques to get your beliefs across?
Well, I don't care to even answer.
I've never seen an interview that you did not dominate.
Why do so many Hollywood stars fear to stand up
and speak their mind?
Well, Mike, I've heard quite a bit about you.
You're supposed to be a pretty rough boy.
When I am sitting here now, being myself,
that's the most difficult thing in the world for any actor
and certainly for me.
because then you do feel naked, you don't have a script.
Mrs. Roosevelt, I think that you will agree
that a good many people hated your husband.
They even hated you.
Oh, yes, a great many do still.
Why?
Is it hard to ask those questions?
- Is it difficult? - No, not at all.
- How do you do it? - Mike: [chuckles]
I'm nosy and in... and insistent
- and not to be pushed aside. - And confident.
Confident that when I ask a question,
there's a reason for its being asked.
It's not a question picked out of the air.
You're seeing behind me...
Mike: You ask tough questions that get behind the facade
to try to understand what's really going on
behind the scenes.
Salvador Dali is a self-confessed genius
with an ingenious flair for publicity,
who sees the world through surrealist eyes.
You said, "I adore three things.
Weakness, old age, and luxury."
Why do you adore old age?
Because I believe young people is completely stupid, you know.
- Young people are stupid. - Exactly.
[chuckles]
Crew member: Yeah, we're rolling.
I'm sitting in Mike Wallace's office.
Normally, he interviews people
and I'm turning the tables on him.
The fact is, I'm a little nervous.
- Why? - I don't know but I am.
Well then let me ask you, what makes a good interview?
- I understand that... - Yeah?
...when you prepare for a broadcast...
Mm-hmm.
...you don't really prepare. You don't...
that is you don't have a script, you don't have questions.
You don't have... What do you do, wing it?
Yeah, basically I do.
- Why? - Because I find that...
I think that I'm a surrogate viewer and I feel so...
I feel really connected to...
to the women who are out there watching me.
I know. But having said that,
still, if you're going to be proxy
you've got to ask the questions
- that they want to ask. - That they want the answers to.
- But... All right. - So, so, so that's what I do.
I ask the questions that I want the answers to.
Mike: Now that you're a film star,
is it all that it's cracked up to be?
No. When you have been in the business
for a certain length of time, you first of all come to realize
that nobody gets there in the first place
without a lotta hard work, disappointment,
- some heartbreaks. - Compromises?
Yes.
Compromises with your own honesty?
Yes.
Mike: It is a form of learning about others
and ourselves through others.
It's almost like a love affair in a strange way.
Beverly Sills: Yeah, boy, you do that a lot.
Do what a lot?
Oh, those love affairs on camera and all that. [chuckles]
- One final question. - Sure,
- I'm beginning to like this. - Mike: [laughing]
Mike: Night Beat defined me for myself.
I suddenly had found my bliss.
Interviewer: You had become Mike Wallace.
Mike: Yeah, exactly.
And suddenly we were discovered
and we were overnight, a hit.
This you immediately knew was the way
- for Mike Wallace to go. - Absolutely. Yeah.
And that's when I became a prick...
on the air.
Mike: Night Beat changed the face of television.
It was a sensation. And then ABC wanted it.
So they made it The Mike Wallace Interview
- and put it on the network. - My name is Mike Wallace.
The cigarette is Parliament.
Announcer: The Mike Wallace Interview.
A new type of interview show
springing up all over the country.
It's the kind of show that really digs
into the heart of things.
Mike: And suddenly that kind of interview
became quite a big hit across the country.
I wouldn't go on Mike Wallace's show
if I had the time.
That guy can cut you to ribbons.
In television drama, few names have the prestige
of that of our guest, Rod Serling.
We'll learn what he means by the price tag
that hangs on success.
The Twilight Zone is your own creation.
You're doing it for money.
How many hours a day do you work right now?
12 to 14 hours a day.
How many days a week?
Seven.
And because those become so large,
what becomes small?
I think probably the really valuable things,
you suddenly find yourself having to compromise
along the line. Giving so many hours to work
and a disproportionate number of fewer hours to family.
[beeps]
Interviewer:
How many times have I been married?
What in the world do you want to ask a question like that for?
What... what relevance does that have?
That's the kind of a question that you might hear
on Hard Copyor A Current Affair or Four Times.
Women and Larry King.
What a saga.
Why are you looking so serious?
Because it's an area of my life I, uh...
haven't done well with. I've done...
You've been married how many times?
- Five. - So your wife
or your love is an intruder.
Is an aside.
You know I used to say, if I came home
and had two messages; "Your wife called urgent,
CNN called urgent."
- I'd call CNN. - No contest?
No contest.
[indistinct chatter]
What the hell is that smug smile about?
What do you regret most
about the decisions of your life?
Oh, that's hard.
Probably, the first bad decision I made was to get married
at the age of 22. Which is damn foolish.
Mike: I married a college chum who was Peter's mother
and Chris Wallace's mother.
Well, we went to school together.
And it became quite apparent
we were married when we were too young
and that was not going to work.
What kind of a father were you?
Hmm. Absent a lot of the time, not very good.
Not very good.
One of the most colorful and notorious gangsters
in the United States in the late 1940s
was Mickey Cohen.
Mickey, you've killed at least one man or how many more?
I have killed no men...
that, uh...
in the first place, didn't deserve killing.
Larry: Did you have any fear of Mickey Cohen?
Mike: No.
But he succeeded to offend all manner of people.
A police chief who happens to be a sadistic degenerate.
Mike: He gave such ammunition with which to sue us for libel,
and everybody did. Everybody did.
What about this statement that you made in your own paper?
You have no right to sit in judgment of me.
I'm not sitting in judgment, I'm simply asking a question.
Mike: We were doing things that were for the time,
revolutionary. I mean asking serious questions.
Asking abrasive questions.
I'm ready any time you want to repeat the stupid question.
Mike: We got into a flock of lawsuits
and it just became too controversial.
This has been the last program.
As tonight's guest, Arthur Larsen has said,
"Before we can tell the world who we are
and before we can act for the future,
we ourselves must know who we are, what we stand for.
And what we mean by freedom."
Mike Wallace, good night.
Mike: And just like that,
The Mike Wallace Interview was off the air.
Hello. I'm Mike Wallace with real news.
News about Revlon's new Lanolite lipstick,
the first non-smear lipstick that actually beauty treats
your lips as you wear it.
Interviewer: How did you feel about moving on
without that show?
Mike: I was lost.
I used to say, I have to do all these things
because I have all these kids to support and so forth
and I knew that that was... that was less than the truth.
Gals...
I was beginning to pay a price
for some of the television work that I had done.
I hated it after a while.
You're right. Within us there seems to be
a frightening void we are forever trying to fill
but never quite do, of lostness.
What do you mean?
You've never felt that feeling?
Interviewer:
[over radio] This is Mike Wallace currently going around the world
in 40 days and reporting to WBZ'sProgram PM...
[narrating] I had been on a trip around the world
for Westinghouse Broadcasting that summer.
[over radio] ...with my portable tape recorder,
I'll bring you an actual word picture
of New Delhi, Cairo, Nairobi, other news making cities...
[narrating] My son Peter had taken the summer off from Yale
and had gone to Greece.
And his mother told me that they hadn't heard from him
you know, in a couple to three weeks.
We didn't hear from him and didn't hear from him.
So finally I said, "Something's got to be wrong.
I'm going to go over and see what's going on."
We didn't know if he'd gone off with a crowd someplace
or met a girl or something of that sort.
And I went to Xylokastro to this youth hostel
and there was... I saw his bag with his clothes.
And then somebody close by said,
they thought that he had gone up this mountain
about three or four miles away.
I got on a donkey and we went up the mountain.
And finally came to a ledge,
very high looking out over the Gulf of Corinth.
And I looked down...
I uh...
I saw my son.
Nothing, nothing, nothing like that
had ever happened to me before.
It was just shattering.
[melancholic music playing]
Morley: I cannot think of anything worse
than losing a child. I mean, we are programmed
so that they will outlive us.
Is that something that still haunts you?
Mike: I was married all that time to my job,
had kids.
I was self-absorbed.
I'm ashamed to say.
My job was more important than my family,
and I became a casualty of that.
Are you never lonely? Honest.
I mean there are the two of you and that's it.
That's nice. Never.
You had a son...
and he died at the age of 40-some odd.
Still not over that?
I'm sorry, I didn't mean to do that.
Okay.
Leona: I'm tough... [soft chuckles]
- What do you mean? - I am tough.
- Oh yeah. - It's not easy.
I can see you're tough as the Dickens.
It seems your only vulnerability.
Don't be silly.
- Mike: There are... - People are vulnerable,
of course, you're vulnerable.
Barbara Walters: Your son died in 1962.
Do you ever get over that?
Mike: I mean there's always that... The memory of this...
I mean, Peter was a... Just a...
It changed your life, didn't it?
Interviewer: Some people when they go through a loss like that
it hardens their heart.
It sounds like it focused your mind.
Focused my mind.
Interviewer: How did it affect your becoming who you are?
Mike: I'd been unwilling to give up
doing certain things that I was doing in television.
Circus folks just can't get enough
of Peter Pan Peanut Butter!
And after Peter died I said to myself,
"What is it that you want to do with your life?"
I don't want to read everybody else's words anymore.
I don't want to do commercials anymore.
I would like to be a serious reporter.
[beep]
Announcer: From CBS News, this special report.
Interviewer: How did 60 Minutes start?
How did you end up there?
What was the state of CBS News?
[indistinct chatter]
Man: You got 30 seconds, 30 seconds.
Good evening. Tonight, See It Now
devotes its entire half hour
to a report on Senator Joseph R. McCarthy.
The other big missile site
is in Matanzas province close to Havana.
Mike: When I first got there, everybody wanted to go work at CBS.
Crew member: Clear that shot! Get Sakhalov out!
- Get 'em out! - Mike: Because it was Cronkite,
Sevareid, Murrow.
Interviewer: That was the essence of news back then in many ways.
Mike: That was the voice of authority.
That was the voice of the establishment
- giving us the news. - And that's the way it is.
Monday, September the second.
Announcer: The world news; concisely summarized
and clearly explained.
This is Walter Cronkite. Good night.
Interviewer: I remember, when the word swept through the newsroom.
Mike Wallace is gonna be a CBS correspondent.
And people thought, oh, my God, the button-down world of CBS.
Wait till this cat gets in there!
He'll really open it up. What is the treatment
that you get when you're frozen out?
Hazed.
Yeah. They were less than cordial.
Are you gone?
Mike: They said who needs this pitchman
for Philip Morris cigarettes?
So here we are. Pennsylvania Station.
Five minutes after seven. The lights have been on...
the lights have been out for about an hour and a half.
Mike Wallace at Pennsylvania Station.
I was tainted and they were pure.
And so I was not greeted by everybody
with great enthusiasm.
And then I met Don Hewitt.
Announcer: The newsroom never sleeps.
The search for stories has the attention
of Cronkite's executive producer, Don Hewitt.
...on camera which we'll illustrate tomorrow.
- [beep] - Crew: Sound roll three,
60 Minutes, interview with Don Hewitt.
Interviewer: Nothing like interviewing your boss.
Makes you real comfortable, you know?
Here's some descriptions of you. You ready?
Manic, brash, genius, cocky, competitive,
perfectionist.
I accept everything but genius.
Call me Tuesday when you get back. Call me collect.
Don: I'm not a brain. I'm not an intellect.
- [indistinct chatter] - In the early days,
when there were that bunch of intellectuals at CBS News,
I think they looked at me as some sort of upstart.
We're in the seventh grade of the junior high school
- division of the... - Don: Mike and I sort of allied
as two roughneck kids who didn't come out of Oxford.
...revolution called New Math is all about...
Interviewer: You said that they were skeptical of you.
Why were they skeptical?
Mike: You know, I've done all manner of things
that had nothing to do with the news.
Mr. Wallace?
- I... I give up. - [students chuckle]
I had to prove myself.
It was apparent to me early on that the only way
that I was going to get people to watch
wasn't because I was the kind of reassuring,
avuncular Walter Cronkite type.
Anchor: Mike Wallace, who has been traveling the country.
What about civil rights? Let's touch on that a second.
Mike: It was because I was gonna research thoroughly
and ask tough questions.
Do you want the lights down a little bit
do you think for fill?
Speed.
Dr. King, you said that you saw white man's hatred
for the Negro more bitter than anything
that you had seen in Mississippi.
What lies at the root of that hatred?
I think it is basically a hatred born of fear.
They fear each other
because they don't know each other,
they don't know each other because they fail
to communicate with each other,
and they fail to communicate
because they are separated from each other.
Minister Malcolm, I believe that you have called
for self-defense units;
rifle clubs ready to execute on the spot
those who threaten the Negro.
In a country that spends I think 50 billion dollars
a year for defense alone,
I'm shocked that there's apprehension over Negroes
trying to do something to defend themselves.
Are you the least bit afraid of what might happen to you?
Oh yes, I probably am a dead man already.
Anchor: Controversial leader, Malcolm X
was gunned down while giving a speech.
[crowd chanting] One man, one vote. One man, one vote.
Anchor: Mike Wallace is on the convention floor
with the Mississippi delegate.
Ed Bradley: Let me tell you about the first time
that I worked with you
- at the Republican convention. -Mike: Mm-hmm.
Whenever you were going to be on the air,
I would stop what I was doing
and leave my quadrant to go watch you work.
As you can see it's bedlam here, Roger, Bob.
I remember you climbing up the steps.
Everybody else was going up the aisles.
- You were the first one to get to them. - Mike: Mm-hmm.
Bradley: I mean it was an amazing thing to watch.
Mike: So what's the point?
Bradley: The point is I was just struck by that.
That there are all of these veteran reporters out there.
No one else thought of that.
Mike: Listen, I would go after a story.
[crowd chanting] No more war! No more war! No more war!
Mike: There was such ferment in the country generally.
Mike: Suddenly, 75-millimeter recoilless rifle rounds
began dropping in here.
Interviewer: You went to Vietnam for the first time.
What did you see? What did you smell? What did you hear?
Mike: I was a hawk when I went there.
And it wasn't long before I began to understand
that wrong war, wrong time, wrong place.
Escalation is no shortcut to peace in Vietnam.
What is the enemy doing? Are these major attacks or...
[explosion]
Television's presence at that war
is what turned the American public against it.
[gunfire]
There was virtually no censorship whatsoever.
Mike: You call the Vietnamese "gokes".
Gooks.
What had you been briefed to do
when you got to Pinkville?
I was searching out the village and gathering up the people.
What kind of people? Men, women, children?
Men, women, children.
- Babies? - Babies.
Made them squat down
and Lieutenant Kelly came over and said,
you know what do with them, don't you?
So he stepped back about 10, 15 feet
and he started shooting them.
And he told me to start shooting them.
So I started shooting. I fired about four clicks
into the group.
How many do you imagine you killed?
I might have killed about 10, 15 of them.
Mm-hmm. Men, women and children.
And babies.
Obviously, the question comes to my mind,
how do you shoot babies?
I don't know, it's just one of them things.
[siren wailing in the distance]
Mike: The question is
what kind of country is the United States?
That, in just the last few years
has killed a president, President Kennedy.
Has killed Martin Luther King.
And now attempts to kill Robert Kennedy,
Malcolm X, the black militant leader.
What kind of curious strain of violence is there
in the American people?
Announcer: 1968...
the most pivotal year since the end of World War Two.
For the country, for politics,
and also in the news business.
The long dark night for America is about to end.
As soon as he gets toward the car.
Rolling?
This was New Hampshire's last hurrah to Nixon.
There's only one name on the Republican ballot
next Tuesday; Richard Nixon.
Mike: I was covering Richard Nixon at the time.
We were getting along so well that Nixon wanted me
to join his campaign as press secretary.
And at that time,
Don Hewitt was a man that everybody
had decided had had it.
He wasn't up to the CBS News standard.
So the folks at CBS News put Hewitt in a room
and said, "Come up with an idea.
Perhaps, we'll put it on the air."
I stole
the idea of 60 Minutes,
lock, stock and barrel from Lifemagazine.
The Nixon campaign in New Hampshire
- has been smooth... - And he came to me and he said,
"Tell you what, I'm going to give you a chance
to do the kind of interviews you used to do
back at Channel 5 withNight Beat."
And so I cast my lot with Don Hewitt.
Cut.
[beep]
60 Minutes,volume one. number one.
New opening, take one.
[indistinct chatter]
Well done for us fellows out here in the trenches.
Crew member: In five.
[beeping]
Dissolve, cue!
Good evening. This is 60 Minutes.
It's a kind of a magazine for television.
Nixon acknowledges now that he withdrew from the press,
that he was afraid of them and their questions.
There's been so much talk in recent years of style,
and of charisma.
No one suggests that you have a good deal of it.
Have you given no thought to this aspect of campaigning?
And of leading?
Richard: Let me make this one point.
Some public men are destined to be loved
and other public men are destined to be disliked.
The most important thing is not whether he's loved
or disliked, but whether he is respected.
And I hope to restore respect to the presidency.
Larry: Did you know Mike, that night, that you had a winner?
Mike: We didn't know what we were up to.
Anchor: A fan at the University of Tennessee wrote
"60 Minutes is wonderful.
Does this mean that it will be dropped in a few weeks?"
We do think this is sort of a new approach.
We realize, of course, that new approaches
are not always instantly accepted.
Mike: We'd finish regularly 85th out of 100 shows in the ratings.
Mike: Tonight, on 60 Minutes...
Mike: Nobody was paying any attention.
We were on the air we were off the air.
- We were preempted. - [beep]
Anchor: From CBS News in Washington.
Nobody thought it was going to last.
I think we first met when Harry announced
he was leaving to go to ABC and...
- That was right. - ...I got the call.
Mm-hmm.
How did you feel about me coming?
Intruder? Somebody you could push around?
Oh, no, no, no, on the contrary I was so far ahead you.
I mean everybody knew me.
Who the dickens was Morley Safer?
You know, big deal.
- I'm Mike Wallace. - I'm Morley Safer.
Those stories and more tonight on 60 Minutes.
I'm Morley Safer.
Mike: We would try and do anything we could at that time.
Really. We were experimenting. We were trying to find out
what worked and what didn't work.
And then suddenly what happened?
Watergate came along.
Mike: In the early days,
The Post was all alone on Watergate
and the White House was denying it
and the rest of the press corps ignoring it...
Shabby journalism...
Mike: There were no other broadcasts
that had the time to devote
to some of the cast of characters of Watergate,
except60 Minutes.
Of all the characters in the Watergate drama,
Gordon Liddy remains the most mysterious.
They called him the dirty tricks artist.
And because I had a relationship
with all of the people in the Nixon administration...
John Ehrlichman was closer to the Oval Office...
...as a result, I began to do interviews
with the entire top cast of characters.
Did you see Senator Weicker enumerate a list
of the illegal or unethical acts of the White House?
- No I didn't. - Mike: Let me read them.
Breaking and entering.
Wiretapping,
conspiracy to foster prostitution,
conspiracy to commit kidnapping.
Destruction of government documents...
Did the president ever tell you
to get rid of the taping equipment?
...forgery of State Department documents
and campaign letters.
Secret slush funds...
Wait a second, you mean Silbert knew
about what Kallenbach was doing for you?
Paying you at that time?
...perjury.
Plans to audit tax returns for political retaliation...
Have you done more than pray?
Have you tried to make it up to those you've hurt?
...theft of psychiatric records.
Plans to firebomb a building...
You offered to have yourself shot,
assassinated,
to reassure everybody that you weren't gonna talk...
All of this by the law and order administration
of Richard Nixon.
Is there a question in there somewhere?
Mike: I mean, these things hit front pages
all across America.
We've got a raft of mail last week
following our story about...
And gave a certain, "What is this60 Minutes?"
Mike: Whenever and however
Mr. Nixon's case is disposed of,
the press' turn will come next. What did he mean?
The press is gonna be blamed for it.
And what can the press do about it if anything?
Hunker down.
Hunker down and go about our business
which is not to be loved
but to go after the truth.
Mike: That's when we began to do the real investigative stuff.
The kind of stuff you hadn't seen at all,
in television.
Standing from the back room I could hear
what was going on in the front office;
a pretty frank discussion about kickbacks.
So I could get five hundred a week?
Pardon me. Yeah, just a second, fellas.
And you know that what you're offering to do
is to break the law.
Why?
Tonight, a story about the big business
in mail order degrees.
Land fraud and swindle.
Kiddie Porn. Child pornography.
I've seen them as young as six years old in here.
- Six years old? - Six years old.
Mike: At that point, I came in.
This time, our camera was no longer hidden.
We have pictures of you
- selling films... - Man: No.
- ...to my colleague here... - No.
Where did these come from?
I don't know! He put over there! This is my films.
Of course, you're paying income tax on this.
- [man laughs] - What are you laughing about?
They called on the Miami Police to get us off their property.
Police: You have no right to be here. I ask you to leave.
You're interrupting a business.
- Don't. Don't. Don't. - Come on in, fellas.
No.
Hey, wait a minute. 60 Minutesis in here.
- Can you believe it? - Mike: How are you?
- 60 Minutes. Hold the phone. - Nice to see you.
Now this is my favorite one. Gosh, what's your last name?
- Wallace. Mike Wallace. - Mike Wallace.
- [distant siren wailing] - [horn blaring]
Don: One day somebody came to me and said,
"You know, you're in the Top Ten." And I said the Top Ten what?
He will talk to Arafat again today.
I didn't know what a rating point was.
How much time do you think Mike has for that thing
following the mail?
Mike: This thing took off for reasons
I still do not understand.
We're not cutting the credits. I think.
We heard that more people watch your show
than Walter Cronkite.
And people watch you more than they watch him.
You know something, Walter is down the hall
and you don't want to get Walter angry at me, do you?
Anchor: Its patented blend of hero reporters
and sweating villains has redefined TV news.
For better or for worse is a question for debate,
but you can't argue with ratings.
60 Minutes is the most watched news program ever.
Okay. We're very excited about our first guest tonight.
His dogged interviewing style...
...singular brand of browbeating charm...
...who is highly respected among his peers.
It's my pleasure to welcome Mike Wallace.
[crowd applauding, cheering]
- David Hartman: Mike Wallace! - Merv Griffin: Mike Wallace!
- Mike Wallace! - Dinah Shore: Mr. Mike Wallace!
Crew member: Rolling.
Why are you doing this now?
- Doing what? - This.
You walked out on us once before.
- Didn't walk out on us. - Well...
I understood that you're paying me
a large amount of money for this.
You're wrong.
- You... - Why are you doing this now?
I'm not running a boiler room operation.
I have no phony real estate scam.
I'm not taking any kickbacks.
Well, there's a stereotype
- of Carson. You know there is. - What is it? What is it?
Ice water in his veins.
- I had that taken out years ago. - Mike: Is that so?
I went to Denmark and had that done,
- it's all over now. - Shy.
- Probably true. - Mike: Defensive.
Sometimes in a social situation, or with people,
I feel a little uncomfortable.
See when I'm in front of an audience,
- it's a different thing. - Why?
I'm in control. I can handle the audience,
and I can set the timing, and I can set the pacing.
And then I can play with that. There's Carson the performer,
then there's Carson the private individual.
When the camera goes on...
- Yeah. - ...they are your family.
- That's right. - Man: Here's AB Roll...
Morley: People started to tune in to us in big numbers
to see what Mike Wallace was gonna be up to next.
Okay.
You're never gonna live it down, Mike. I guarantee it.
I'll use it to show just what the press is.
You're contemptible, I mean this not for the camera.
I'd like you to get out of here, immediately.
I hope you got it and I hope you have the guts
to use it!
There is a new billionaire in town. Trump's the name.
Donald Trump is a major dealmaker,
a swashbuckler.
Donald,
you're in your late 30s.
You got 40 years to live, minimum.
Well I hope you're right about that.
What are you gonna do?
There are a lot of things to do.
You know, a fertile imagination and a good fertile mind, Mike,
it's an amazing... It's really amazing
what can be thought of, there's so many things to do.
- Politics? - There's so many...
No, not politics.
You've said that you could do a better job at negotiating
an arms control agreement with the Soviets,
than some of these professionals
who've been trying to do it for years.
I didn't say me, Mike, I said somebody has to do it.
If it were me, that'd be fine,
- I could do it. - You...
Somebody has to help this country
and if they don't, the country and the world
are in big trouble.
Because within a short period of time,
as sure as we're sitting here, there's not gonna be a country
and there's not gonna be a world.
Anchor: He could get with a question,
- to the very core of the story. - How much do you make?
[speaking in foreign language]
- What's your salary? - [speaking in foreign language]
Hard question.
Simple question.
Morley: There was no off switch
If it was in his head, it came out of his mouth.
You really believe that you lived lives before?
- And... - Oh, yes, Mike. I don't...
There is no doubt in my mind about it.
Mike: Mm-hmm.
And you really believe in extraterrestrial...
Have they... Do they come visit you on the porch?
"Now you're being unpleasant, Wallace" is what you're saying.
Oh, yes. This is what I was a little afraid of.
- Mike: Oh... - You don't have to be that unpleasant.
It doesn't become you, you know?
Morley: But Mike would steal stories.
There is that schoolboy competitiveness.
- [indistinct chatter] - Maestro, tell me something...
Morley: Competitive beyond belief.
Here we are at Madison Square Garden...
Anchor: And at the same time, unsure of himself.
Mr. Right...
Morley: That he had not paid his dues as a journalist.
That uncertainty or that even perhaps shame...
- haunted him. - What is a racist?
Morley: He was going to go out and prove
I'm as good as anybody in this racket.
60,000 jobs have gone down the drain. You've laid out...
Morley: And I once said to him, I said,
"Mike, you don't have to prove yourself, for God's sake.
Everybody knows you're good. You're terrific.
You're a big star."
You've had a reputation as a very difficult guy.
For years.
Why? Where did that all come from, Kirk?
It shows you what a good actor I am,
because I really am the sweetest.
Come on. Everybody says
that in the old days you were an exceedingly...
Even your own kids said that you were very difficult.
Oh, there's no doubt about that.
But I think most the things that I did wrong
comes out of an insecurity.
What the dickens are you insecure about?
Michael, I think that no one is ever free of insecurities
whether maybe in the relationship with their kids,
in the relationship with their wife,
and in the relationship with their work.
Twenty or 30 years of psychoanalysis,
I say to myself, what is it that she's trying to find out
- that takes 20 to 30 years? - I'm a slow learner.
For some reason I feel like your father
- or your uncle or something. - Barbra: Well, that's good.
At least you're feeling.
- That's good. - Oh, I've got to tell you,
my feelings are as close to the surface...
- Are they? - ...as your own.
- So you put on this facade... - You are damn right.
...in other words, you put on this facade of toughness.
Crew member: Roll one, take one!
Don: Look, there's a lot of temperament in Mike.
It's gonna be dull as hell, please.
Crew member: Take three!
No, no, no. You're going much too fast.
Crew member: Take five!
What the fuck are doing? This is supposed to be here.
- Are you reading? - Yes.
Here we go, this is the one.
God damn, could give me a slightly shot...
slightly different shot?
But show me someone with no temperament,
and I'll show you someone with no talent.
Sweet shit, should we start from the beginning again?
The journalist as a household word,
Oriana Fallaci.
She is an Italian journalist. Resourceful, ambitious,
arrogant.
Her revealing interviews are merely conversations
to begin with, she says.
Then she transcribes them herself
and turns them into morality dramas.
She plays the role of judge; the interviewee is on trial,
and few are found innocent.
I hate objectivity, you know. I have told it many times.
I do not believe in objectivity.
I believe in what I see, what I hear and what I feel.
- Power, you have power? - Oh no, I have no power.
- No? None whatsoever? - You are not one of those
who think that we journalists have power.
- No? - Ah.
We are like the dogs. [mimics dog barking]
And nobody listens to us.
You're an entertainer?
I'm an historian.
- You're not an historian. - Yes, I am.
- You're a journalist. - No, sir.
- A journalist is an historian. - No, no, wait.
Listen, a journalist is a person who writes history
in the same moment that history happens.
And it is the damn best way to write history.
[crowd chanting in Persian]
Good evening. In Tehran tonight,
the American embassy is in the hands
of several hundred Iranian students
who took control after a three-hour skirmish
with U.S. Marines. They are holding hostages.
One report says as many as a hundred.
Muslim students in Iran spurred on by Ayatollah Khomeini
today escalated their war against what he calls
the Great Satan America.
I'm really infuriated because...
this is not Islam.
Islam doesn't teach at all
what this man... Such a lunatic like this man.
Mike: I was standing in a toxic waste dump
in Stockton, California.
When all of a sudden the word came:
Khomeini will see you.
Morley: Did you have any concern
about going over there at that time?
Mike: What are they going to do Take you hostage yourself?
Morley: Maybe. They took the other Americans hostage.
You never thought... It never crossed your mind?
Mike: Honest, if you got a hell of a story
on your hands, no.
Morley: What was the atmosphere in the room like?
Mike: I was immediately told
you have to give us the questions ahead of time.
Morley: Was there a lot of tension in the room
when you went in there?
Mike: He had his own cameras there.
Everybody had to be satisfied with the questions.
[speaking in foreign language]
Well, let's... let us begin.
Do you still say, Imam,
that if the Shah is not returned to Iran
that those American hostages in the American embassy compound
will not be freed?
[speaking in foreign language]
But that is not an answer to whether the hostages
will be freed.
His Eminence prefers that you put up
the rest of the questions and then later on,
I'll translate for you so that...
his Eminence can be faster.
Unless I know what he is saying, it will not make sense.
I must understand as we go.
Otherwise it is not an interview
and I will have no way of understanding.
[speaking in foreign language]
Imam, President Sadat of Egypt,
a devoutly religious man,
a Muslim,
says that what you are doing now is quote, "A disgrace to Islam."
And he calls you, Imam,
forgive me, his words, not mine,
"A lunatic."
I know that you have heard that comment.
I'm not sure if I can get the answer
because this was not in the questions.
Please ask him. I'm sure... It's a very simple,
straightforward question.
I heard that the Imam is a disgrace to Islam.
And he used the word a lunatic.
[speaking in foreign language]
Then he is a traitor to Islam, Sadat?
[speaking in foreign language]
He calls upon the Egyptian people
- to overthrow Sadat. - Translator: Exactly.
Interviewer: It's the first time I remember you
asking a question that way.
"Forgive me."
It's a very artful way to ask the question.
Mike: In effect, he called for the overthrow
of Anwar Sadat.
That was interpreted
as calling for the assassination.
[gunfire]
And of course, that's exactly what happened.
Anchor: The celebration turned to terror.
President Sadat and others on the reviewing stand with him,
raked with gunfire.
President Sadat,
62 years old is dead.
Charles: Mr. Wallace.
Are you aware that what you are doing
is seriously endangering people?
That's the way you're going to educate the public,
- through your questions? - Through the questions
and the answers, yes.
Are you tempted during those interviews,
to usurp
the powers of our secretary of state
and go right for "I'll...
Mike Wallace will settle this!"
Television journalism has been coming
under recent criticism.
Some polls have shown that public confidence
is eroding.
We have heard increasingly talk about news glut.
Information is becoming certainly a bigger business.
- Is it bad? - It's hard to cope with, I guess.
You used the word "business",
and let's face it. It is a business.
The business of network news
has become one of the highest stakes games in television.
Interviewer:
I think there are too many news magazines
on the networks now, sure.
Good evening. I'm Hugh Downs and this is 20/20.
Announcer: On the ABC News Magazine.
Anchor: Dateline Monday.
- Anchor 1: Day One. - Anchor 2: This is Nightline.
Mike: I think the reason they're there
is because there has been a thirst in the audience.
How to turn news into a primetime ratings hit.
I think the magazine programs outside of the network purview
have helped journalism tremendously.
Like Bonnie and Clyde,
they crossed the country in a crime rampage.
Maury Povich: Pitbull terriers. Kids' pets or killer dogs?
I'm Maury Povich. Tonight on A Current Affair.
Crew member: Take two!
- All right, here we go. - Crew member: Standby.
- Rolling? - You gotta be back, buddy.
You gotta be out of the shot.
So Keigel Vay, who himself stood
to profit handsomely when his clients expand...
You reach people very well that way in a very...
I'm not ashamed to use the word in a very dramatic way to say,
- wait a minute. - Charles: Mr. Taylor,
is what Mr. Wallace does good journalism?
[all laughing]
I think it's marvelous drama,
and has very little to do with journalism.
I can't believe that I'm hearing this from you.
I really cannot believe it.
Mr. Wallace.
Do you think that the way he reports on business
- is good journalism? - Yes.
Why won't you say the same for him? I mean that's...
Taylor: Because I don't, I don't think it's journalism.
I think it's show business.
Bring it back down, let's do it again.
Mike: We were the number one broadcast in America.
But I don't care who you are and how lucky,
you realize that...
life is going to even up somehow.
Perfect, let's go home.
[overlapping conversations]
Life is gonna turn around and bite you in the back.
Interviewer: When60 Minutes was at the peak
of its power in the early '80s,
CBS News and you personally are sued
by General William Westmoreland,
the commander of American Forces
in the lost American war...
- Mm-hmm. - ...in Vietnam.
I have been subjected to a vicious, scurrilous
and premeditated attack
on my character and personal integrity.
The sham was perpetrated by the unscrupulous
and arrogant, Mike Wallace.
With distorted false and specious information
an attempt to execute me on the guillotine...
of public opinion.
Retired U.S. Army General William Westmoreland today
filed suit against CBS Incorporated.
He charged in federal court that he was libeled
in a CBS News documentary
about enemy troop strength reports
during the Vietnam War.
You couldn't ask for more troops.
Therefore, you couldn't let the enemy
be perceived as larger.
Well, that is absolutely fallacious.
It has no validity, whatsoever.
I'm absolutely amazed that you would come out
with a statement like that.
- It's not a statement... - It has...
- It's a question. - It has no basis, whatsoever.
Didn't you make this clear in your August 20th cable...
William: No, no, yeah, no.
I have a copy of your August 20th cable...
Sure, okay, okay.
Spelling out the command position
on the self-defense controversy.
As you put up in the cable, you say the principle reason
why the South Defense Militia must go, quote,
"Was press reaction."
I made the decision. It was my responsibility.
I don't regret making it. I stand by it.
And the facts prove that I was right.
- Now, let's stop it. - All right, Sir.
It was all there.
The arrogance, the color, the drama, the contrived plot,
the close shots...
everything but the truth.
[camera shutters clicking]
Mike Wallace and his boy George Crile
in my view...
are a disgrace to American journalism.
[horns blaring]
Anchor: Opening arguments began today
in the 120 million-dollar libel case
by William Westmoreland against CBS.
Many journalists worry that the immediate accusations
could damage public trust in all the media.
There have also been accusations
that Wallace only played the part of a reporter.
Anchor: TV Guide called it a smear
and that triggered a top-level internal investigation.
I want to talk about the Westmoreland case.
The TV Guide article
that originally caused so many questions
about the whole Westmoreland case says,
"George Crile, the producer of the Westmoreland Hour,
wrote virtually all of your questions."
- True? - He wrote a lot of questions.
Don Cowet said "Mike Wallace,
America's most feared investigative reporter
had merely been a puppet on George Crile's knee."
Do you think so?
- What do you think? - Oh, of course not.
Is that the way you usually work,
with two thirds of your questions
written by someone else?
I was at that same time trying to do
a good many pieces on 60 Minutes.
- And so... - So why do they need you?
I mean if somebody else is writing...
Well, that's a perfectly good question.
Not to have something to do with the so-called...
star system or the...
- Or the... Heavy System. - You don't want to be thought
of as an actor who comes in and reads questions.
- And I think that you're... - And you're not.
- That's right, okay.
So, what's the question?
Doesn't it trouble you to be called a puppet?
[camera shutter clicking]
Winston Churchill called it "The Black Dog".
Abe Lincoln was so anguished by it he cried,
"I am now the most miserable man living.
If what I feel were equally distributed
to the whole human family,
there would be not one cheerful face on earth."
It is mental depression.
George: Fear is something that I've never known.
I've never been afraid of anything.
But here was this damnable kind of annoying fear that...
- that maybe I was losing my grip... - Well, now wait a minute.
Former Assistant Secretary of Defense,
head of successful company, a millionaire and...
then all of a sudden?
That's right. These things started to happen.
Now, you must understand...
that this is a gradual onset. It's an insidious thing.
I got to the point where this thing
preyed on my mind so and I was filled
with such agonizing fear that I couldn't...
hardly bring myself to answer the phone
for fear it'd be somebody I'd have to talk to.
Total continuing, unrelenting, unremitting depression,
24 hours a day.
Morley: A lot of people who... who suffer from depression
say they really had it
a long time before it was actually diagnosed.
Is that true?
Mike: I had no idea what it was when it hit me.
The battle goes on in Federal court
over CBS's documentary
on enemy troop strength during the Vietnam War.
[indistinct chatter]
Mike: I had been asking nasty questions
of all kinds of people for some years
and now you are afraid that they're gonna start
asking those questions of you.
[indistinct chatter]
Mike: And day, after day, after day,
you were called every dirty name imaginable.
You begin to wonder if you haven't...
done something dishonest.
You don't want to eat.
You find it difficult to sleep.
[sighs] It's never out of your mind.
Anchor: The trial has already produced
more than 6,000 pages of testimony...
Mike: Went on for years and years.
Morley Safer: And you worked through it.
Mike: I had no idea what I was doing.
I would ask a question.
Couldn't hear or understand the answer.
Didn't know what question was supposed to come next.
Look, I was ashamed of having a depression.
That's one of the things that's so awful about it.
But there are some... there is some blot.
[elevator dings]
- Morley Safer: It was such a dirty word. - Mike: That's correct.
That's correct.
You whispered.
All you focus on is yourself...
and how bad you feel.
You... You're wrapped up in here...
in your own petty...
monumental selfishness...
self-absorption.
- [camera shutters clicking] - [indistinct chatter]
Mike: Pains and spaciness...
and feelings of fraud and feelings of...
that I was a fake and... and...
and self-esteem that just plummeted.
Did you ever contemplate suicide, Mr. Pike?
I... I felt like a dead man. And I wished I were dead.
Interviewer:
Oh, I hit bottom, yeah.
- Interviewer: - Yes.
- Interviewer: - No.
Interviewer:
I know that, uh...
articles have been written about that but...
And I... I really don't want to particularly discuss it.
Mike: When you don't sleep,
hour after hour, night after night,
day after day...
and you are obsessed...
with what a fourth-rate individual you are,
you contemplate anything to get out of it.
But, thank God...
there was enough common sense so that I didn't really...
try anything.
Interviewer:
- Yeah. - Interviewer:
[indistinct chatter]
Interviewer: Did you think about killing yourself?
Mike: Of course. Of course you do.
To get out of it?
Damn right.
That'll be a shock to people. I mean, Mike Wallace,
the man on top of the world.
Morley Safer: All of the fame and the glory
and the accolades and everything,
really kind of didn't mean anything to you anymore?
It was just dust like everything else?
Mike,
did you try to commit suicide at one point?
I thought very seriously about it.
I've never...
I promise you, anybody who's in a deep depression...
thinks about suicide.
Uh...
I've never said this before.
Yeah, I tried.
And Mary found me.
I wrote a note...
and Mary found it.
She found the pills that I was taking on the floor.
I was asleep.
You got lucky.
Yes, I did get lucky.
I don't know why the hell you asked me that question
cause other people have... and I've...
It's the first time I've answered it honestly.
Cut.
[somber music playing]
Good evening, this is the CBS Evening News,
Dan Rather reporting.
One of the New York newspaper headlines reads,
"Westy Raises White Flag".
This after William Westmoreland
suddenly dropped his 120 million-dollar libel suit
against CBS.
Westmoreland will get no money from CBS.
The documentary about which he complained
will remain intact,
without apology and without any retraction.
Reporter: CBS agrees to sign a statement saying,
"CBS respects General Westmoreland's long
and faithful service to his country."
Oh, I consider that I won.
By... by virtue of that statement.
When a plaintiff wants to drop a lawsuit
without any money and without any apology,
- I think we ought to let him. - [all laughing]
The war between the General and the network
officially ended today...
but there are serious questions that remain.
I think the greatest risk we have...
is that these suits will intimidate
many news organizations,
because the cost of doing aggressive journalism
is going to be exorbitant.
What it comes down to, if you listen to the media,
is a question of how tough journalism will be.
It's what journalists call the "chilling effect".
Tell me what you think of investigative journalism
these days.
It's lousy, isn't it?
- No. - Well, come on.
They go after the guy who runs the pizza place
in the corner because he charges too much
for pepperoni, but they won't go after the Pentagon
because things like the Westmoreland suit
has scared corporations to death.
Last year, American's smoked 582 billion cigarettes.
The Surgeon General of the United States
says that cigarettes cause lung cancer.
More deaths, than the combined total
of Americans killed each year by auto, fire,
and other accidents, by alcohol, murder, and suicide,
by AIDS, cocaine, and heroin.
Do you consider tobacco a health hazard?
No, I think that when the secret
to cancer is finally discovered,
that we're gonna find, that it's brought on by a virus.
Interviewer: Are we ready?
You have chronicled the demise of the cigarette.
And unfortunately, one of the biggest scandals
to hit 60 Minutes,
was the case of Jeffrey Wigand.
Mike: We have been trying for years, to talk to the CEO
of the tobacco companies.
And all of a sudden, we heard that we were set
to learn what this insider had to offer.
The head of research and development
for a major tobacco company who wants to lay it on the line.
Dr. Wigand...
you're the first tobacco executive
as far as I know to come forward.
The element in cigarettes, that make them attractive,
- is the nicotine, right? - Most certainly.
And that's what cigarettes are for?
It's a delivery device for nicotine.
Put it in your mouth, light it up,
- and you're gonna get your fix. - You get your fix.
Are you worried about going public this way?
Somewhat.
- I had life threats on my kids. - What?
It says, "Leave tobacco alone or else...
you'll find your kids hurt.
They're pretty girls now."
Then why are you doing it?
Because I believe it's right.
Okay, we got it?
Jeffrey Wigand: I just want to make sure that
until I get a lot of things in order...
Oh, don't worry about that.
We're not going to go forward with any kind
- of broadcasting on this? - Absolutely.
Mike: We had the story cold.
We know that it's true.
And all of a sudden, we were told by our lawyers
that we had induced the breaking
of a confidentiality agreement
between Jeff Wigand and the Brown
and Williamson Tobacco Company.
Don Hewitt: We've got a gun pointed at our head,
of 15 billion dollars.
We may opt to get out of the line of fire.
Mike: Put it on the air. Let them sue.
I cannot believe that any court
would have come down against us.
In your office or Phil's?
Interviewer: I'm sure that this was your argument
to CBS, to Don.
They did not want to hear that argument.
The management didn't want to hear that argument.
- [sighs] - Interviewer: Even between you and Don?
Mike: Don didn't want to hear it.
Yes, we did! You agreed!
No, I just disagree with you totally.
Mike: He was on the company's side and I and a couple of others...
were not.
The sense is that you lost
your dedication to getting the truth out.
That happened at one point for a period
of about 12 to 15 hours.
And that was all of it.
We at 60 Minutesare proud of working here
and at CBS News,
and so we were dismayed that the management at CBS
had seen fit to give in to perceived threats
of legal action against us by a tobacco industry giant.
Woman: I can't believe that there wasn't something else
that you could have done. Is there not?
No, no.
Mike went as far as you... Mike went further than I did.
-Mike raised hell about it. - 60 Minuteshas been to court
or has been sued, not infrequently over the years
and we've never lost one.
Because we've been willing to go to court.
This is the first time that they said no.
Today, it was revealed that CBS's 60 Minutes
had decided to back off a tough investigative report
on the powerful tobacco industry.
...raising new questions tonight about
corporate power and what's acceptable
in journalism, what's not.
This is part of what's so sad
because Mike Wallace and Don Hewitt
are pioneers of aggressive investigative
television journalism
and the fact that they are intimidated
is very disturbing.
Woman: Why don't you stand up and say "I'm Mike Wallace.
I've got a reputation.
Either this piece goes on air or I'm walking?"
Mike: If I'm outside, that piec would never...
Would never gotten on the air, period.
CBS Management wouldn't let us broadcast
our original story, and our interview
with Jeffrey Wigand.
But now, things have changed.
Last week, the Wall Street Journal got hold of,
and published a confidential deposition Wigand gave
in a Mississippi case.
And while a lawsuit is still a possibility,
not putting Jeffrey Wigand's story on60 Minutes,
no longer is.
The hope would be that no matter who owns
the network or who owns the paper...
they'll have the courage
and the sense of obligation
to let the truth be told.
You very carefully said the hope, the confidence?
The hope.
People ask why I didn't quit.
I really do believe that I would've walked away...
and they would have said, "Well, it's a pity.
Well, he was getting old, anyway."
They would've said, "Fine. So long."
Crew member: Take ten.
Sound goes by.
- It was my first... - I'll ask the question please.
I beg your pardon.
Tell me this. You really said, "It has been my experience
that one cannot in any shape or form
depend on human relations for any lasting reward.
It is only work that truly satisfies?"
Yes, that stands by you.
It isn't that many people don't...
um, add a great deal to your life...
and I'm talking about as a permanent thing.
That's the least disappointing relationship you can have.
- Is work? - Mm-hmm.
And really, that's the way you've lived your life.
Unfortunately, yes.
Contract is running down. Everybody wants to know
- if you're going to retire. - Contract is not running down.
Contract will be up a year from now.
Well, that's running down in my book.
Are you going to quit or are you going to keep going?
Larry King: Mike Wallace, the stories keep appearing
that you're cutting back.
How much so and how much longer with the program?
I don't think it's any of your business, Larry.
- The, uh... - [all laughing]
Mike could slow down. Mike could stop.
Mike can do anything he wants to do,
and yet he continues to work just as hard.
Why?
Why still the same need, and push, and drive?
Why... What does he think he hasn't accomplished?
Interviewer: Tell me your dreams, Mike.
If I were your psychiatrist, and I said,
"Did you dream last night?
Or what's the last dream you remember?"
Where am I?
Mike?
Mike Wallace?
What are you doing here?
Why, I'm interviewing you. We're on television.
I'm giving you a chance to defend yourself
before all my viewers.
- Defend myself? - [all laughing]
- I mean, what... what did I do? - What are you trying to prove?
Prove? Nothing!
- [all laughing] - Then why don't you quit?
Mike: Father Kirsch...
I want to read you what Susan Sandoval
says about you.
She was 15 years old when she woke up
with Father Robert Kirsch's tongue
in her mouth...
- You guys are bastards. - ...in a small New Mexico town,
she lost her virginity that day.
Now, why would she say that about you, Father Kirsch,
if it were not so?
Why would she say that?
Interviewer:
Do I worry about death? I'm getting closer.
I think about it every now and then, I confess.
Look, when you're 75 and you see people
around you dropping, sure.
How much in the retirement packages
of the people who have voted okay on this,
- how much are they getting? - Civilian: Answer the question.
Mike: It's a very simple question, Mr. Silverman.
Why are you so reluctant...
- Why are you so reluctant... - Aide: Excuse me. You gotta get over here, Mike.
Go on, just get right over here.
You're kind of the last man standing in this line of work
- of your generation. - [Mike scoffs]
Morley: You have some tough questions left?
Mike: Sure.
- Morley: Haven't run out? - [birds chirping]
You're in good shape, yes.
- That's remarkable. - You, too.
- You too, yeah, really. - Well, for...
87.
Could somebody please tell me what's going on with the...
Crew member: It's not working. They're doing a test for you.
- What's that? - Crew member: They're doing a sound test before we...
I can barely hear.
I'm deaf. I can't see very well.
- Oh! - [claps hands]
There we go.
Corruption is every place in Russia.
To get anything done...
money.
Is Russia a democracy?
[speaking in Russian]
In order to be a journalist today in Russia...
do you have to, in effect...
bow the head and bend the knee to Putin?
[chuckles]
[speaking in Russian]
Your people run these news channels.
One channel even begins each newscast with,
"What did Putin do today?
Who did he see?
What does..." and so forth and so forth.
[speaking in Russian]
Where?
Your English is really very, very good, isn't it?
You understand every word that I'm saying.
You don't need the translation.
What would you like to say to the American people?
All the best to every family in America.
Good luck.
Do you feel it's time to...
maybe pack it in and reflect?
- Or is... - Reflect about what?
- All of... - Gimme a break.
What am I gonna reflect about?
About the fact that I'm not workin'?
- Do you hate getting old? - No, I feel good.
I feel fine. I don't hate getting old.
- You still work... - I don't even hate to die.
- I don't give a damn. - What do you mean?
I don't care.
You mean when your toes turn up.
That's it.
That don't ever bother me.
And I want you to give if you will the answer
- to just one more question. - Frank Lloyd Wright: Go ahead.
Do you believe in your personal immortality?
Yes. To me, young has no meaning.
It's something you can do nothing about, nothing at all.
But youth is a quality.
And if you have it, you never lose it.
And when they put you into the box,
that's your immortality.
If I die tomorrow...
I've accomplished far more than I ever thought I was going to accomplish.
And far more than anyone else ever thought
I was going to accomplish. So, I'm proud of myself...
for hanging in there,
persevering, working unbelievably hard and winning.
Winning the game of broadcast journalism.
I've won it.
Anchor: Do you understand why some people feel...
such disaffection from the mainstream media?
Oh, yeah, no. They think we're wild-eyed...
commies, liberals.
Yes?
That's what they think.
We're in a fairly cynical,
almost hostile public environment.
Nobody believes anything anymore, to generalize.
And it's very important that they believe us.
And if they don't believe us, we're useless.
Is this nation getting better or getting worse?
Oh, I think this nation is getting worse.
We're not as straightforward...
a people, as we used to be.
Interviewer: Do you think the public is less interested
in news than it used to be? Less trusting what they hear?
Mike: I think they're probably less trusting you know,
because there are so many voices...
- That is not fair. - Mike: So many voices, so many...
who do you trust?
Anchor: Whether it's too much or made up,
all of this strikes at the heart
of the most important product journalists
have to offer: their credibility.
Anchor: Our job is to ask those questions
and you know something, this is not new.
This is the relationship we have
with all levels of power.
A narrow and distorted picture of America often emerges
from the televised news.
The views do not represent the views of America.
Everybody back there. The fake news media,
- look at all of them. - [audience cheering]
The government at its highest levels
with its powers over us,
criticizes us so strongly, so emotionally
and with such self-serving purposes.
The temptation is for television news
to go easy, to duck controversies,
stay out of trouble, please the government.
But that would be fatal.
Or as Walter said,
"We're not defending a precious right of our own,
of freedom of speech and press.
What we're defending is the people's right to know.
- [camera beeps] - [birds chirping]
Mike: You ever think about an epitaph?
Epitaph?
Never gave it a moment's thought.
Mike: Give it a moment.
I've had a fine, various, not so fine life.
And there comes a time when you say, "What's left?"
It's time to go.
Interviewer:
Uh...
The fellow who...
The fellow who did...
The fellow who investigated, who muckraked,
who asked some tough questions and who...
Uh, bullshit.
Come on. I don't know.
Interviewer:
Well, fine, but I don't have to answer them.
- I think it's a lousy question. - Well, you're a legend!
I think it's a lousy question.
Interviewer:
Yeah. Tough, but fair.
[grunts]
The guy who enjoyed immensely what he did.
Did it honestly, straightforwardly,
perhaps, moved the dialogue ahead...
that much in certain areas.
Used his life sensibly.
Basically, a decent guy.
That's... that would be fine.
- Arthur: Epitaph. - [crickets chirping]
I'll leave the first thought that occurs to me is,
he worked awful hard.
Mike: And you're still working.
Arthur: Oh, yeah. Life without work to me
would be incredible, unbelievable.
I couldn't imagine it.
Like breathing.
And what did he work for?
Oh, some little...
moment of truth.
[crickets chirping]
Mike: All right. If that's it, then.
Crew member: Oh, yeah. He can hear us.
Ready?
Mike: Are we goin'? Cut a sec.
All right, one last run, and that is it.
If I put this on the air, I'm gonna look like a damn fool.
You deserve to look like a damn fool
at least once.
- Johnny Carson: What do you make a week? - I'd be ashamed
- to tell you. - [chuckles]
You better learn to sing and dance.
Yeah. [chuckles]
Man: You got it, perfect. All right, good.
Man: Seven rolling, take one.
Oh, yeah. You're smiling, why are you smiling?
I feel something is coming up that I'm going to get angry.
Man: Seven rolling, take one.
Man: Roll 12 A, sound, take 11.
When I see people saying purposely negative things,
they have problems, not me, they have problems.
Man: We just ran out of film.
- You go from 40... - [phone rings]
- Oh, we forgot to turn off the phone. - It's all right. Yes.
[Barbara laughs]
- You know something? - Barbara: Mm-hmm?
I like you a lot better than I remembered feeling about you.
I hate you with a venomous passion right now.
- That's a good place to stop. - [Barbra sniffs]
[beeps]