Redford Says He Linked Deep Throat to FBI (Barf Alert)

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - Robert Redford, who played Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward in "All the President's Men," said he used to speculate on who Deep Throat was and had figured "it probably had to do with the FBI."

Redford said the revelation that former Deputy FBI Director Mark Felt was Deep Throat, the Post's secret informant in the Watergate scandal, has him "waiting to see if anybody is going to connect where we were then and where we are now, because the same elements are absolutely in place, only they're worse. ...

"You can go right down the line (in the Bush administration), there's about 15 issues as strong or as big as the Watergate break-in was that have come and died out," Redford said Thursday in an interview with The Salt Lake Tribune.

He cited the fruitless search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and the "Downing Street memo" suggesting Bush's officials tweaked intelligence to support their invasion plans.

"There are guys out there digging and digging. There are stories appearing every single day," he said. "But is it getting any traction with the public?"

It was 33 years ago Friday - June 17, 1972 - that burglars broke into the Democratic National Committee's offices in the Watergate Hotel in Washington.

As the Washington Post stories came out and reporters Woodward and Carl Bernstein became famous, be became struck by the contrast between Woodward, a Republican WASP, and Bernstein, a Jewish liberal .

"They didn't like each other but they had to work together," Redford said. "I thought, those are the ingredients of a pretty dynamic little movie."

Redford called Woodward and Bernstein, but the reporters stalled him for months.

Redford said he and Woodward finally "had this quiet, dark, shadowy meeting. He said, 'If we treated you a little rough, we didn't think it was you. ... When we heard your name, we thought it was a phony setup.'"

Woodward and Bernstein were writing a book about Watergate, and they made a deal that when the movie rights were sold, Redford would produce the film. After Warner Bros. got the movie rights, the studio insisted Redford not just produce but star. Dustin Hoffman played Bernstein.

Redford once asked Woodward who Deep Throat was, but the reporter would not tell him.

"Some part of me did not want it to come out, because it was this great piece of melodrama in the middle of this movie," he said.

Redford said that when he thought Deep Throat was someone in the FBI, "I thought it may be (then FBI director) Patrick Gray, but, on the other hand, why would he do that since he was a friend of Nixon's?"

In creating a Deep Throat for the film, Redford said he decided "he should be a figure of dignity who was in real pain. He was tortured having to say these things. That's why I wanted Hal (Holbrook) - I felt he was an actor of great dignity and stature."

The revelation that Mark Felt was Deep Throat has brought renewed interest in Watergate, and in movies about the era. The Washington Post reported Thursday that Felt's family has signed a book deal and sold the film rights to Tom Hanks' production company.

Redford is among the ten most over-rated actors ever. His Sundance Channel, now with butt-boy Al Franken, ought to be removed by the FCC for wasted band space and, by the FDA for content that is harmful to the nation's mental health.

Paul Newman, Elizabeth Taylor, Roberto Dinero and Tom Cruise are in that same group of pseudo-star.

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