With “The Murdochs: Empire of Influence” CNN gives us a family drama to rival “Succession”
If you believe that Rupert Murdoch has only pushed mainstream journalism to the right and for the worse since 9/11, Maury Povich will avuncularly disabuse that notion in “The Murdochs: Empire of Influence.”
The one-time host of “A Current Affair” fondly recalls flying to Germany to cover the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, to the bewilderment of Dan Rather and Tom Brokaw — the giants of television journalism at the time. “A Current Affair” was syndicated TV tabloid trash; what was it doing covering a world event? To answer that, Povich̵[ads1]7;s colleague Gordon Elliott ran to a local firehouse, got a pickaxe and took some theatrical digs at the big concrete symbol of communism.
Then a local asked Elliott, “Oh, can I have it for a while?” The tabloid newsman hands the guy the axe, and he starts swinging. An enterprising photographer’s click later and boom – there he was on the cover of Newsweek.
Compared to what Murdoch would create on the media landscape, political discourse and democracy in general, this is a cheeky detail. But that makes Povich’s point: If something is missing from the landscape—whether it refers to a frame of the story or the entire scope of it—he will not only fill that gap, but use that device to change the whole picture.
Not only that, adds Povich, there is no disconnection or overwriting of what Murdoch has done. “You can’t delete it,” he says at the top of the second episode. “It’s here to stay.”
Of the dozens of journalists, biographers and political consultants who serve as on-camera pundits on CNN’s seven-part series alongside whatever species Roger Stone is classified as these days, Povich stands out as the guy who gets the joke. Why wouldn’t he? Murdoch made Povich a celebrity by playing one of the most trashy shows on television.
Even that was a stepping stone to bigger things. First it was “A Current Affair,” then a broadcast network, Fox, then Fox News and . . . we will. We live in the world Murdoch has created – something most of us would rather forget.
If something is missing from the landscape, Murdoch will not only fill that gap, but use that device to change the whole picture.
The manufacturers know that and that is why they take a side from the subject in designing it. Rupert Murdoch, like his henchman, the late Roger Ailes, made a fortune by giving the public what they want. So while “The Murdochs” is based on a greatness of a feature by New York Times journalists Jonathan Mahler and Jim Rutenberg, who serve as consulting producers and appear throughout, it looks, feels and struts the same way as “Succession”.
Jesse Armstrong doesn’t exactly make a secret of patterning the Roys after the Murdochs, along with the Hearsts, Mercers, Redstones and others. But a biographical, comprehensive look at the baron’s family is required to appreciate the accuracy of his portraiture.
The only detail Armstrong really wonders about is the Roy children’s intelligence, but that’s on purpose. If Shiv, Kendall and Roman were as talented as Lachlan, James and Elisabeth, “Sucsession” wouldn’t be half as entertaining. It’s better for all of us that the Roy kids think about their place in a legacy that mirrors that of the Murdoch kids, only with the brainpower of the Trumps.
Rupert Murdoch accompanied by sons James (right) and Lachlan (left) on March 5, 2016 in London, England. (John Phillips/Getty Images)
“The Murdochs” are two stories presented in tandem, as Mahler explains. The first covers the rise and dominance of media mogul Rupert Murdoch. The other is the story of Murdoch as a father.
It opens with the near-death incident in 2018 that throws the question of who will inherit the kingdom into overdrive, before returning to examine Rupert’s misshapen youth as the privileged son of a distant father he could never satisfy. When Rupert realizes that his parents’ modest media empire will not pass to him, he makes it his life’s mission to eclipse the modest legacy his father built.
Murdoch’s steady expansion of his empire is common knowledge to those who care to know about such things. But “The Murdochs” excels at filling in the emotional and psychological voids of the story, that’s where the juice is. For a family willing to give away very little of themselves to the public, there is much to read into the moves Lachlan, James and Elisabeth make – and their father’s regular efforts to play them off each other as some kind of Darwinian test of fitness.
But the relationship between Rupert and his children is even stranger than their fictional counterparts, because by all accounts he seems to care about them. It’s just that he cares even more about his empire.
Such grace notes of universal recognition allow the viewer to find a way to respect the tenacity that fuels Murdoch’s monstrous nature.
“The Murdochs” is equal-minded in its investigation, to the point that it enables a person to absorb the insights of truly despicable people with equanimity. Stone, for example, has nothing but respect and admiration for Murdoch, of course. But it is presented in a mix of people who admit the bold recklessness of Murdoch’s business acumen, even as they disagree with disdain for how he plays the game. That is, knowing what we know about Stone, if he admires the man, the show helps us get it.
Such grace notes of universal recognition allow the viewer to find a way to respect the tenacity that fuels Murdoch’s monstrous nature. The story of an early kidnapping gone wrong that leads to a woman’s death opens our eyes to the family’s vulnerability before their paterfamilias built the fortress around them; they are people after all.
And yet the head of this family also pushed thousands of journalists out of their jobs in one fell swoop to appease a prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, who was not friendly to unions or labor organizing. This is just one of the many obscenities Murdoch is blamed for orchestrating. The later episodes cover the one we know best and still struggle to shake off – which is Donald Trump’s kingship.
“The Murdochs” stands on its own merits for its double-entendre servings of media insight on the one hand and juicy biographical inquiry on the other. It is fast and safe, enlightening and above all entertaining.
Rupert Murdoch and his wife Wendy Deng on February 27, 2005 in West Hollywood, California. (Mark Mainz/Getty Images)
Along with puzzling through what drives Lachlan, James and Elisabeth, we’re also invited to think about what Anna did for Murdoch’s ego – and why that well ran dry when he met Wendi Deng, whom he married in 1999. They divorced in 2013, only for Murdoch to marry Jerry Hall in 2016. And she finalized her divorce from him last month.
No one in the family agreed to participate in the production of the series, but the producers are making an extensive effort to help us understand who Rupert Murdoch is and what drives him.
By extension, we also understand why entities like Fox News and Murdoch’s newspapers are so devoted to catering to the darkest side of the human impulse—to stir up our fear and hatred, and steer governments into division and ruin. It’s all in the service of the empire’s bottom line and the interests of his constituency, which consists of . . . him.
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Most documentary filmmakers are quick to point out that the parallels the audience finds in their work and current events are coincidental. In most cases it is true. Ken Burns’ latest effort, “The US and the Holocaust” points directly to the similarities between the nativist atmosphere in pre-World War II America and Germany and the anxieties that have gripped us since January 6, 2021. Still, he says, he and his co-producers began to work on that project in 2015.
However, debuting “The Murdochs” six weeks after the midterm is a choice. It won’t affect the outcome of any races – nothing like that. But if CNN wants to make a vaguely admiring, crowd-pleasing point about its rival as it lurches to the right to score some of its audience, this is a smart way to do it.
“The Murdochs: Empire of Influence” launches with a special two-episode premiere at 9:00 and 10:00 p.m. Sunday, September 25, on CNN. The next episode is broadcast at 10 p.m. Sundays on CNN.
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