'White House Plumbers’ Episode 1: CIA and FBI are a match made in hell
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: In HBO’s new miniseries ‘White House Plumbers,’ one thing can be rest assured — there will be a lot of goof-ups. The Watergate scandal and the people who broke in to that infamous complex take centre stage in HBO’s newest political satire. The streaming behemoth is previously known for another political humour filled show called ‘Veep’ from the minds of Peter Huyck and Alex Gregory, who have now brought forth a satirical take on the biggest scandal in American political history.
There are two men at the centre of it all - E Howard Hunt, a former CIA agent, and Gordon Liddy, former FBI agent, who heads the Special Intelligence Unit of the White House to stop the classified leaks to the press. They are members of two powerful investigative agencies at play in the show, which was also the case in real life — the CIA, known for its clandestine and covert operations across the world and FBI, handling things on the domestic front. When both these powers shake hands on the orders of the President to complete a task, there are fireworks. In ‘White House Plumbers,’ the power clash between Hunt and Liddy is for all to see from the time they meet. History tells us that in the Watergate scandal, Hunt and Liddy, the two agents on the different ends of the investigative spectrum worked closely at the behest of President Richard Nixon but in the show, a clear contempt is visible between Hunt and Liddy for the other’s agency.
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Hunt’s first image of Liddy is witnessing him teaching a self-defense lesson to his secretary by instructing her to use a pencil to jab the throat of the attacker. Although Liddy defends his way, Hunt comes in with a healthy disregard for this tactic. The tension between the two escalates when Liddy tells Hunt that he heads the Special Intelligence Unit (SIU) appointed to stop the leaks and he will not give it up. This doesn’t sit well with Hunt, who gives off the impression that since he’s ex-CIA, his profile is superior to Liddy, who worked in the FBI. The buck doesn’t stop here.
When Liddy and Hunt visit an undercover CIA safe house, Hunt again makes fun of Liddy when the former FBI agent calls ‘black ops’ as ‘black bags.’ Liddy also makes a huge error in picking up walkie talkies for the job to break in the office of Ellsberg’s psychiatrist, which leads to a great communication error between the teams working on the job. Hunt shouts at Liddy for this mistake, but again when Hunt’s men fail to break into the office of Ellsberg’s psychiatrist, Liddy goes up and ridicules Hunt’s men, making his stance more powerful before Hunt. There’s a constant power tussle between the two, with each of them making mistakes that hinders the job that they are given.
In the first episode, no one comes out at top, but Hunt and Liddy slowly begin to develop a camaraderie that will help them nail or in this case, fail the next big job of re-electing President Nixon.
Do families add to the turmoil for Hunt and Liddy?
Hunt has a beautiful wife named Dorothy Hunt, who seems to be more accomplished than him. He has a daughter who is threatening to drop out of college, a son who is developing a thing for counter-culture, and a younger son finding his way. Hunt’s personal life is in shambles. But Liddy paints a better picture with five kids and a gleaming wife. Hunt and Liddy meet for a family dinner to learn more about each other in an attempt to work better together, but that meeting turns out to be a more painful experience for Hunt and his wife. It appears that the CIA man and the FBI man will have to keep trying to build rapport with each other at the White House only.
