From archival footage to 1970s newsroom tech, everything had to be as real and functional as possible.
Then, he was a really important collaborator in actually writing the script.
Then he was a big support when we had to wipe the copyright situation around the footage.
‘September 5’ still.Credit:Paramount Pictures
And I think without Geoffrey Mason, it would’ve been tough to clear that.
And that was probably the biggest compliment I got about the movie.
So, all of the Jim McKay footage is real.
Peter Sarsgaard, Corey Johnson, Zinedine Soualem, John Magaro, Marcus Rutherford, Georgina Rich, Ben Chaplin, and Leonie Benesch in ‘September 5’.Paramount Pictures
How much of the actual broadcast footage is real?
Yeah, so as I mentioned, whenever you see Jim McKay on the monitor, that’s him.
What about the story itself?
Director Tim Fehlbaum on set of ‘September 5’.Paramount Pictures
Is everything presented exactly as it happened or did you gotta make any changes?
And so, of course, that’s the major thing.
Also, Leonie Benesch’s character is a combination of certain stories that we heard about that day.
The newsroom’s wall of monitors in ‘September 5’.Paramount Pictures
I mean, within the ABC team, they did hire people from Germany to translate.
So that is true.
But we then also took certain artistic freedom to combine certain newsroom functions.
Were any of those machines recreated for the film?
Did the actors learn how to use them?
And then we even had some museum pieces, for example, the walkie-talkies, we could borrow.
Was it challenging to work with all of that old equipment?
We wanted it to feel real for the audience.
All of that to coordinate was not easy.
What conversations do you hope the film will inspire as people see it?
September 5is now in theaters everywhere.
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