Conviction of Richard Nixon The Untold Story of the Frost/Nixon Interviews

PART I Washington The invitation came in a curious, roundabout fashion. Joseph Kraft, the syndicated Washington columnist who was acting as David Frost's recruiter, encountered my mother at a less-than-intimate Washington party and casually wondered where that son of hers was--whether Richard, James, or Thomas, he was not sure--who had worked with Frank Mankiewicz on a Watergate book several years ago. He was back in North Carolina, she replied, had just finished a book on the Joan Little case, and was teaching creative writing. Do you suppose, Kraft wondered, that he would be interested in working with David Frost on the Nixon interviews? Mom was discreet, as always. She would ask. David Frost? I knew he was British. I had vaguely pleasant memories of That Was the Week That Was (TW3, I later learned to say), quite brilliant satire and political humor that was my style ("birth control: booby prize of the week" was an example). Hadn't there been an interview show later? I thought I remembered a sensitive interview with Jimmy Webb, one of my favorite singers, after "By the Time I Get to Phoenix," but it might have been Merv Griffin. I couldn't be sure. Clearly, I needed to find out more. Sure enough, Frost had had an interview show; he had even once offered my father $10,000 to appear on his show for ninety minutes, but Dad had turned the offer down. In 1968 Frost had interviewed all the presidential candidates, including Richard Nixon. From James David Barber, the political scientist at nearby Duke University, I discovered that Frost had asked questions of Nixon like "Are there any essentially American characteristics?" and "For an American today, what can the dream or goal be?" and (perhaps best of all) "This is a vast question, I know, but at root, what would you say that people are on earth for?" Work with David Frost on the Nixon interviews? He wouldn't need much help to devise questions like those. But Barber cautioned against cynicism. The responses from Nixon to Frost's grandiose offerings had been revealing, both in political and personal terms. Barber had quoted copiously from them in his acclaimed Presidential Character. Frost was, Barber felt, a subtle and clever interviewer, probably better than anyone we had on the American scene to interview a slippery Nixon. So I headed for New York and Frost's somewhat seedy offices in the Plaza Hotel. I had to wait for a time to see him. When I was ushered in, Frost apologized profusely for the delay; he had finally gotten through to the South of France after trying for four hours. I nodded as if I understood his frustration. At first we discussed his bona fides rather than mine. Expressed in polite language, I had three questions: Why, I asked, could he do any better than, say, Dan Rather or Mike Wallace? In the back of my mind was Wallace's boorish failure in interrogating H. R. Haldeman. It had been one of the outrages of modern television; Haldeman had reportedly received $100,000 for his time, and nothing of interest had come from the interview. What was the argument for paying Nixon so much money? (The scandal sheet The National Enquirer was reporting that week that Nixon would make $650,000 for the interviews. It was much more, I learned later.) And would Frost feel a certain awe or respect in Nixon's presence, so characteristic of American newspeople, or was he prepared to go for the jugular? Frost was an amiable good sport. We drank warm champagne, and he offered me an expensive cigar in a plastic case. (Later, during the interviews, Nixon would say to me, "David Frost always goes first class. What are you having for lunch today--duck under glass?") He had interviewed many world leaders since 1967, Frost asserted, and had earned his reputation in Britain as a withering interrogator. Playing to my novelist's sensibility, he said he had never written a novel, butReston, James, Jr. is the author of 'Conviction of Richard Nixon The Untold Story of the Frost/Nixon Interviews', published 2007 under ISBN 9780307394200 and ISBN 0307394204.