Frost’s ‘gamble’ to interview nixon
AUGUST 10, 1975
It was a deal that led to one of the most-watched political interviews in history – and an extraordinary apology from a disgraced president.
On August 10, 1975, British broadcaster David Frost revealed he had bought the exclusive rights to interview former US president Richard Nixon, often nicknamed Tricky Dicky by critics.
The pair signed a 13-page contract exactly one year after Nixon was forced to resign from office by the Watergate Scandal, for which he had faced certain impeachment.
They agreed on 12 interviews taped over four weeks in March, 1977, that totalled around 29 hours.
Nixon had so far kept silent about his departure from the Oval Office and his involvement in Watergate.
The political scandal followed the Nixon administration’s attempt to cover up its involvement in a break-in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office complex in Washington in 1972.
The interviews were split into four broadcasts that aired in May, 1977, and were seen around the world.
The first, shown on May 5, addressed Watergate and drew 45 million viewers, the largest television audience for a political interview in history. Frost’s penetrating interview elicited an unexpected apology from Nixon.
He said he put “the American people through two years of needless agony”.
He added: “I let the American people down and I have to carry that burden with me for the rest of my life.”
And when asked about his abuses of presidential power, Nixon famously replied:
“Well, when the president does it, that means that it is not illegal.”
In fact, he proclaimed his innocence over Watergate until his death in 1994.
In 1975, Frost refused to say how much he had paid for the exclusive after a bidding war with US broadcasters, many of whom later derided it as “chequebook journalism”.
But in his 2006 memoir, Shooting Stars, Frost revealed it had cost him $600,000 (the equivalent of £3 million today), which he raised by selling his 5% stake in London Weekend Television.
He wrote: “It was one of the riskiest ventures on which I’ve ever embarked.
“I became determined to interview him in depth, to resolve the questions left unanswered by his grimly unapologetic departure.
“I sold my shares and threw the money into the venture.
“If I’d kept them, they would have been worth £37m when Granada took over LWT in 1994.
“But I would still have made the same decision.”