Why ‘Good Night, and Good Luck’s’ 1950s story of media intimidation is eerily relevant in Trump’s America

The historical echoes in “Good Night, and Good Luck” are extraordinary. Some might even say they’re eerie. On Saturday at 7pm ET, viewers around the world can see for themselves when CNN televises the blockbuster hit Broadway play starring George Clooney. The play transports viewers back to the 1950s but feels equally relevant in the 2020s with its themes of unrestrained political power, corporate timidity and journalistic integrity. Add ‘Good Night, Good Luck’ on CNN to your calendar: Apple / Outlook or Google The real-life drama recounted in the play took place at CBS, the same network that is currently being targeted by President Donald Trump. That’s one of the reasons why the play’s dialogue feels ripped from recent headlines. Clooney plays Edward R. Murrow, the iconic CBS journalist who was once dubbed “the man who put a spine in broadcasting.” Murrow helmed “See It Now,” a program that pioneered the new medium of television by telling in-depth stories, incorporating film clips and interviewing newsmakers at a time when other shows simply relayed the headlines. In the early ’50s, Murrow and producing partner Fred Friendly were alarmed by what Friendly called in his 1967 memoir the “problem of blacklisting and guilt by association.” At the time, the country was gripped by Cold War paranoia, some of it stoked by Senator Joseph McCarthy’s trumped-up claims about communist infiltration of the government, Hollywood and other sectors. In a later era, McCarthy would have been accused of spreading misinformation and attacking free speech. Murrow and Friendly thought about devoting an episode to the senator and his investigations, but they wanted a dramatic way to illustrate the subject. They found it with Milo Radulovich, an Air Force reserve officer who was fired over his relatives’ alleged communist views. Radulovich was a compelling, sympathetic speaker on camera, and Murrow’s report on him not only stunned viewers across the country, but it also led the Air Force to reverse course. “The Radulovich program was television’s first attempt to do something about the contagion of fear that had come to be known as McCarthyism,” Friendly recalled. Where McCarthyism meets Trumpism That’s where “Good Night, and Good Luck” begins — with a journalistic triumph that foreshadowed fierce reports about McCarthy’s witch hunts and attempted retaliation by the senator and his allies. Clooney first made the project into a movie in 2005. It was adapted for the stage last year and opened on Broadway in March, this time with Clooney playing Murrow instead of Friendly. Both versions recreate Murrow’s actual televised monologues and feature McCarthy’s real filmed diatribes. “The line between investigating and persecuting is a very fine one,” Murrow said in a pivotal essay about McCarthy, uttering words that could just as easily apply to Trump’s campaign of retribution. A moment later, Murrow accused McCarthy of exploiting people’s fears. The same charge is leveled against Trump constantly. “This is no time for men who oppose Senator McCarthy’s methods to keep silent, or for those who approve,” Murrow said, sounding just like the activists who are urging outspoken resistance to Trump’s methods. In April, Trump issued an executive order directing the Justice Department to investigate Miles Taylor, a former Trump homeland security official who penned an essay and a book, “Anonymous,” about the president’s recklessness. This week Taylor spoke out about being on Trump’s “blacklist,” using the same language that defined the Red Scare of the ’50s and destroyed many careers back then. “People are afraid,” Taylor said on CNN’s “The Arena with Kasie Hunt.” He warned that staying silent, ducking from the fight, only empowers demagogues. Murrow did not duck. Other journalists had excoriated McCarthy earlier, in print and on the radio, but Murrow met the medium and the moment in 1954, demonstrating the senator’s smear tactics and stirring a severe public backlash. Afterward, McCarthy targeted not just Murrow, but also the CBS network and Alcoa, the single corporate sponsor of “See It Now.” McCarthy threatened to investigate the aluminum maker. “We’re in for a helluva fight,” CBS president William Paley told Murrow. The two men were friends and allies, but only to a point. Paley had to juggle the sponsors, CBS-affiliated stations across the country, and government officials who controlled station licenses. In a Paley biography, “In All His Glory,” Sally Bedell Smith observed that two key commissioners at the FCC, the federal agency in charge of licensing, were “friends of McCarthy.” The relationship between Paley and Murrow was ultimately fractured for reasons that are portrayed in the play. ‘An act of extortion…’ Looking back at the Murrow years, historian Theodore White wrote that CBS was “a huge corporation more vulnerable than most to government pressure and Washington reprisal.” Those exact same words could be written today, as CBS parent Paramount waits for the Trump-era FCC to approve its pending merger with Skydance Media. Billions of dollars are on the line. The merger review process has been made much more complicated by Trump’s lawsuit against CBS, in which he baselessly accuses “60 Minutes” of trying to tip the scales of the 2024 election against him. While legal experts have said CBS is well-positioned to defeat the suit, Paramount has sought to strike a settlement deal with Trump instead. Inside “60 Minutes,” “everyone thinks this lawsuit is an act of extortion, everyone,” a network correspondent told CNN. In a crossover of sorts between the ‘50s and today, Clooney appeared on “60 Minutes” in March to promote the new play. He invoked the parallels between McCarthyism and the present political climate. “ABC has just settled a lawsuit with the Trump administration,” Clooney said. “And CBS News is in the process…” There, Jon Wertheim’s narration took over, as the correspondent explained Trump’s lawsuit. “We’re seeing this idea of using government to scare or fine or use corporations to make journalists smaller,” Clooney said. He called it a fight “for the ages.” Trump watched the segment, and he belittled Clooney as a “second-rate movie ‘star’.” On stage, Clooney as Murrow challenges theatergoers to consider the roles and responsibilities of both journalists and corporate bosses. Ann M. Sperber, author of a best-selling biography, “Murrow: His Life and Times,” found that Murrow was asking himself those very questions at the dawn of the TV age. Murrow, she wrote, sketched out an essay for The Atlantic in early 1949 but never completed it. He wrote notes to himself about “editorial control” over news, about “Who decides,” and whether the television business will “regard news as anything more than a saleable commodity?” Murrow wrote to himself that we “need to argue this out before patterns become set and we all begin to see pictures of our country and the world that just aren’t true.” Seventy-six years later, the arguments are as relevant and necessary today.