Wednesday, February 16, 2011

Set your PVRs? Canadians to see banned Kennedy series

National Post reports on how History Television Channel in the US folded on the Canadian-produced series The Kennedys after Kennedy loyalists complained it wasn't accurate -- read, it has too much extracurricular presidential bonking. But it will run in April on History Television in Canada, and on a zillion other channels around the world.

As someone says in the article, if literal specific accuracy to the documented historical record is so vital in film drama, where would The King's Speech or The Social Network or The Queen  -- or any other drama -- be?

That's Katie Holmes and Greg Kinnear playing the leads (photo from National Post).

Update, Feb 17: Mary Stokes observes that (US) History Channel's declaration that The Kennedys is insufficiently accurate for its standards
also operates indirectly to authenicate what they do show as accurate and 'true'--which is dubious, or at least arguable,
and wisely points out:
the comments by some Canadian critics that are contemptuous of the States, to wit "thank God that couldn't happen here," forget the controversies over The Valour and the Horror and Prairie Giant. It can and does happen here.
Too true, and many historians lent themselves to the campaigns to silence those programs.
 
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