Peter Landesman and Liam Neeson talk Mark Felt and Watergate

Director Peter Landesman and actor Liam Neeson talk about their work on the movie Mark Felt, which details the journey of the anonymous investigator that exposed the Watergate scandal
Liam Neeson as Mark Felt
Liam Neeson as Mark Felt

Director Peter Landesman and actor Liam Neeson talk about their work on the movie Mark Felt: The Man Who Brought Down the White House. The film is a spy thriller biopic of American figure Mark Felt aka “Deep Throat”, who took on an anonymous identity to lead investigators toward the political Watergate scandal of 1972.

When did you start writing the film and when did you start to shoot it? 
Peter Landesman: I started writing almost immediately after Felt confessed to being Deep Throat in 2005. That was the answer to the greatest political mystery of all time and no one knew who Felt was. I had no idea, so I started writing it then and we started shooting about a year and a half ago so there was a 10 year gestation period. 

What part of the movie fascinates you the most?
PL: It’s really an FBI story, and it really shows how the FBI, as an entity, is a piece of mechanisation, is a machine. It rebels and bites the hand that feeds it, which is the White House. That part I love and was fascinating to me. Felt was running the FBI for many years and knew everything. He knew too much, they couldn’t get rid of him. 

On Mark Felt 
PL: While Felt was dealing with the corrupt White House and taking down the most powerful man on the planet, he had a combustible alcoholic wife who was really like Lady Macbeth, really twisting the knife and really giving him a hard time. He had a daughter who had been gone for 3 years, but he loved this girl. He was afraid that she’ll actually join the weather underground, which in those days was the equivalent of ISIS. So, he as an FBI man hunting for weather underground, hunting his daughter, trying to keep his wife together; then Watergate happens, they destroy the FBI from the inside out, Munich massacre happens – all this within the same month. So the fact that he was under that much pressure from every aspect and each one of these things could destroy a man. The fact that he was juggling three, four, five of these balls and kept it together and then became this creature completely anonymously. Walking away into the sunset without credit, I think, it is a remarkable task. 

On casting Liam Neeson
PL: Mark Felt was a spy. He was still and quiet. He would just scan and he wouldn’t make big moves and Liam has that kind of a graceful dignity. He doesn’t move much, but when he does, it is very, very powerful. He was the only actor I went to, and it was a really organic conversation. He understood what it was and what we’re trying to do and we agreed over lunch and it was an effortless, beautiful journey.

Were you familiar with the Watergate scandal before this film?
Liam Neeson: During the Watergate, in the North of Ireland, we were going through our own troubles. So, I was kind of aware about Watergate, from the periphery of it, but Peter Landsman, the writer and director who was an ex-investigative journalist – a very good one – showed me the script and I knew very little about it. So I started doing a little research and I realised how huge Watergate was. Not just for America but for the rest of the society.  

On his performance being described as similar to Mark Felt 
LN: I wanted to present a certain facet of the man. There was very little known about his private life, even to Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, the two famous reporters who had a particular relationship with Mark Felt over the years never knew about his relationship with his wife and especially about the relationship with his daughter who ran off to join a communal. He was a man who could compartmentalise his life which I guess, being an FBI man for 30 years, you had to do. And he was well trained by J Edgar Hoover who was his boss!

Did you learn about the remaining aspects of his life through his remaining family members?
LN: Yes, a certain amount of stuff is written about him. Peter Landsman got to know Mark when he gave his interview in 2005 to say that he was Deep Throat. So Peter met him and got to know him and his family a little bit. 

If Mark Felt was alive today, what is the question that you would want to ask him?
LN: I think I would want to ask him how he did compartmentalize his life the way he did. He was under enormous strain, and incredible stress over a long period of time and just how kept his composure together. I’d like to hear his take on it. 

Mark Felt released in India on Friday.
 

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