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'It's not so interesting to me to talk about bad people,' Cahn continued. Cahn pointed to Paterno's previously impeccable reputation as an educator, and, to use the words of the school's fight song, a 'molder of men.' He was reverently called 'Saint Joe,' and 'JoePa.' 'And I don't think it was a line of bullshit, I think it was real,' she said.

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It's Paterno's inadequacies the movie delves into - as well as the gathering media storm (kicked off by Ganim, a consultant on Paterno who won a Pulitzer Prize for her coverage of Sandusky in the Patriot-News) around him that will end his career. 'I don't think there's a lot of moral ambiguity in Sandusky,' which is why Cahn - who has written for The West Wing, Grey's Anatomy, and Homeland - featured him 'as little as humanly possible' in the screenplay. 'The parallel there was overwhelming,' Cahn said.Īs a character, though, Sandusky (Jim Johnson) barely appears, and when he does, he's almost a specter. But what was on Cahn's mind was Donald Trump's 'locker room talk' excuse for his Access Hollywood live-mic sexual assault confession, since many of Sandusky's crimes took place in the locker room showers of Penn State's Nittany Lions football team. Richards), told BuzzFeed News: 'If you look at #MeToo, it's like, 'Well, everyone knew about Harvey.’ That dynamic of We all knew, but nobody said - that was the thing that was interesting to me.' The resonant timing for Paterno is accidental HBO had first wanted to do a Paterno movie with Pacino in 2012 and began actively moving forward in 2014. In 2018, it's impossible to view Paterno without drawing parallels to the months-long national reckoning on sexual harassment, abuse, and assault precipitated by the exposés about Harvey Weinstein in the New York Times and the New Yorker in early October.ĭebora Cahn, the final writer on the film (she is credited with John C. Through flashbacks and Paterno's stubborn and naive conversations with his family - during which it becomes clear he did not do nearly enough to stop Sandusky, his former defensive coordinator - the film makes a powerful point about community responsibility.

Here's why: Paterno - which stars Al Pacino, is directed by Barry Levinson, and premieres on HBO on April 7 - builds a compelling case to implicate the adult bystanders who enabled Sandusky's crimes against children, which included other Penn State officials. Why the heck is anyone talking about Joe Paterno?'

It's spectacularly unworthy of conversation, I'm sorry. 'Somebody six months from retirement failed to see the big picture and didn't vigorously protect children? Of course you goddamn fire him. 'I honestly don't know why anybody's talking about Joe Paterno,' Gillum says, sounding close to rage. Ganim then asks what he thinks about 'the Paterno situation,' alluding to the firing of the beloved Penn State football coach that had caused violent student riots the night before. 'This took three years of waiting, of a scared boy telling a horror story,' he says to reporter Sara Ganim (Riley Keough), detailing the anguish Aaron has experienced, resulting in multiple suicide attempts. 1' in the Jerry Sandusky case - is describing the hell his teenage patient has gone through since Aaron first reported that Sandusky had raped him.

There's a scene toward the end of Paterno in which a character named Michael Gillum (Jim Santangeli), the psychologist for Aaron Fisher - better known as 'Victim No.