Word: frostings
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...Nixon's Frost...
...President and his interviewer were made for each other. The son of a Methodist minister in Kent, Frost worked worked worked himself up from the middle-class to be a top boy at Cambridge and, by 24, the host of the BBC satirical show That Was the Week That Was. Like Nixon, Frost could look false on TV - not being a host but doing one, as if relaxing in public was a test he'd crammed for. Neither Frost nor Nixon possessed a huggable personality. They rose to the top of their fields by a triumph of their will...
...producer and celebrity more than a wit, Frost quickly antagonized some of the major funnymen of his generation. Peter Cook, of the Beyond the Fringe comedy quartet, called him "the bubonic plagiarist" for performing a similar impression of Prime Minister Harold Macmillan similar to Cook's at Cambridge. Many of the Monty Python troupe had worked for Frost on earlier shows, and in the sketch "Timmy Williams Coffee Time" Eric Idle played Frost as a gladhander preening for TV crews while ignoring the plaints of a recently widowed friend. Pythonite John Cleese, on the radio show I'm Sorry...
...movie Frost is deeply indebted to the parodists' image. He's a man who has a smile for every crisis, a glib deflection of every insult. The main character change in the film is when Frost stops trying to seduce Nixon and starts quizzing him like a prosecutor. On the shows he hosted in Britain, the U.S. and Australia, Frost could certainly be toothy and unctuous. But as the actual interviews show, Frost's demeanor was skeptical. He never looks frightened or abashed, just focused on getting the goods. When he lays out the three declarations of guilt he wants...
...movie revs up to the gotcha moment when Frost traps Nixon into acknowledging his Watergate crimes and apologizing to the country. The reality is a tad more ambiguous. Frost is magnificent when, having pressed Nixon to say he made more than mistakes, Nixon asks him what word he would suggest. He tosses his clipboard aside and presents a three-count indictment - still a thrilling TV frisson. Nixon does say he let the country down, but couches his confession is so many subordinate clauses that he could leave the ring believing Frost's knockout was only technical. If the exchange lacks...