Susan Granger’s review of “The Day Reagan Was Shot” (Showtime TV)
As President Ronald Reagan was leaving an AFL-CIO luncheon at the Washington Hilton Hotel on March 30, 1981, a psychopath, John Hinckley, fired six bullets at Reagan and his entourage. This made-for-television movie winds behind-the-scenes through the inherent chaos of the 24 hours that followed. While reading a Reagan biography, writer/director Cyrus Nowrasteh was intrigued by the varying, vastly inconsistent, even contradictory, accounts of different powerful men about the crisis and conflicts of that day. “There’s a lot of information on public record,” he notes. “Every major beat in the story is supportable…(but) not being in the situation room or the hospital, I have to imagine a dialogue for the characters. That’s dramatic license.” And Nowrasteh has woven an exciting, entertaining drama showing how people, even with the right motives, can make horrible blunders and mistakes under pressure. Richard Crenna embodies so many of Reagan’s expressions and mannerisms that he’s quite convincing, as is Holland Taylor as Nancy Reagan, while Richard Dreyfuss captures the intensity and ambition of Secretary of State Alexander Haig. Haig is perhaps best remembered for his misstatement of Presidential succession, telling the press corps, “I am in control here,” since Vice-President George Bush was on a plane in Texas. Above all, the production acknowledges Reagan’s courage, wit and grace under pressure. On the Granger TV-Movie Gauge, “The Day Reagan Was Shot” is a captivating, compelling 7. It premieres on Showtime TV on Sun., Dec. 9, at 9 p.m., preceded by a New York Times documentary “Bulletproof: Reagan After Hinckley” and followed by “At Reagan’s Side,” a 20-minute follow-up of interviews with those involved.
