Editor’s note: Page to Oscar is a recurring Booked & Screened series exploring Oscar-nominated and winning adapted screenplays—and how those stories make the leap from page to film.

Fifty years ago this month, “All the President’s Men” hit theaters. It offered a behind-the-scenes look at how Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein investigated and reported on the Watergate scandal. 

The movie, which starred Hollywood legends Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman, was released April 5, 1976, less than two years after President Richard Nixon resigned the presidency over the Watergate scandal. Woodward and Bernstein played a notable role in exposing Nixon’s involvement in the Watergate complex break-in, ultimately leading to his impeachment. 

“All the President’s Men,” the book the two journalists wrote about their investigative reporting, came out in 1974, allowing both the book and the film to capitalize on the freshness and intense interest in the Watergate scandal. 

But that wasn’t the only reason the film struck such a chord. Its realness, urgency and focus on the investigative process—rather than the crimes and political fallout—set the standard for journalism adaptations for decades to come. In doing so, it showed that adapting journalism wasn’t just about recreating events, it was about translating the process. 

The reporters became the story, which any good journalist knows is usually a no-no, even if it’s exactly what makes the film work. 

There were plenty of films about journalists and big scoops prior to “All the President’s Men”—”His Girl Friday,” “Ace in the Hole” and “The Day the Earth Caught Fire” to name a few. But it was the first to really make the act of reporting the story itself, and not focus on the spectacle of whatever remarkable event the reporters are covering. 

Nixon is at the heart of the book and film, but never once do we actually have an actor portray him on screen. The audience sees him in TV news clips and hears audio from his infamous recordings, but that’s the extent of his presence. 

The primary set is a nearly exact replica of The Washington Post’s newsroom. We’re taken to a dark, dingy parking garage, a variety of middle class living rooms, and apartment building hallways. We never enter the White House and we only briefly see inside the Watergate complex at the very beginning of the film.

Even when the film enters more official spaces, they’re stripped of spectacle. Woodward attends a court hearing but it’s a simple arraignment full of note-taking and names being read out. At the Library of Congress, people monotonously shuffle through documents. 

Even the newsroom isn’t glamorous in the way audiences might expect. There are glaring, fluorescent lights, teetering stacks of paper and endless phone calls with lots of muttering, note-scratching and people having to repeat themselves. As someone who’s spent the better part of two decades in a newsroom, this is beyond authentic. I can smell the terrible coffee. 

“All the President’s Men” creates tension by showing us what we weren’t as familiar with behind the scenes of the Watergate scandal. In 1976, most of America was already familiar with the who, what, when, where and whys of the story. They saw the hearings, read the news reports, watched Nixon resign live on television. What “All the President’s Men” does—like any good piece of reporting—is answer the “how.” 

The film was rewarded for its efforts with eight Academy Award nominations, winning Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor (Robards), Best Art Direction and Best Sound. In the screenplay category it faced some stiff competition from “Bound for Glory,” based on the memoir by Woody Guthrie; “Fellini’s Casanova;” “The Seven-Per-Cent Solution” about Sherlock Holmes; and “Voyage of the Damned,” a non-fiction World War II story. 

About the writer

Danielle Haynes is the co-founder and co-editor of Booked & Screened, covering book-to-screen adaptations, film and TV development.