Earlier today, I spoke with Cyrus
Nowrasteh, writer and producer of last year’s network television miniseries, The Path to 9/11, about the controversy
surrounding the film’s DVD (non)release.
As you may recall, Mr. Nowrasteh was at the center of the political firestorm created when Bill Clinton, Sandy Berger, and others took issue with the film’s portrayal of their handling of Osama bin Laden in the mid-1990s.
In the days leading up to the film’s premier, leading
Democrats called on Disney to either pull the film or edit it in a manner that cast
a favorable light on the efforts of the
Clearly the letter was a thinly veiled threat to pull ABC’s broadcast license if the network did not accommodate the former administration’s efforts to censor the project. Disney brass not only buckled to the demands of Clinton’s surrogates, but appears to have permanently sidelined the film’s distribution.
Cyrus Nowrasteh is an award winning writer, director, and producer. In addition to Path to 9/11, his credits include Into the West, La Femme Nikita, and The Day Reagan was Shot. Mr. Nowrasteh was also a speaker at this year’s OC Liberty Film Festival where he discussed the pressures that were brought to bear by powerful political allies of the previous administration, the death threats made on him and his family, and the challenges of making a film in a highly charged political environment.
Mr. Nowrasteh is adamant that his film offers a fair and
accurate account of the events that led to the attacks on 9/11. Cyrus explains,
“This was a very balanced miniseries. We cover 8 ½ years and unfortunately for [my
critics] many of those years were during the
When contemplating the future of The Path to 9/11, Nowrasteh is cautiously optimistic and is considering a variety of alternatives for getting the DVD into the hands of a curious public.
Catch Nowrasteh on Hugh Hewitt’s radio program this afternoon on KRLA 870 at 5:00 p.m. and on the O’Reilly Factor on Fox News at 5:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m. PST.
Further reading: Full text of today’s Los Angeles Times article by Martin Miller here.
Stay tuned for updates…