'White House Plumbers' Episode 1 Review: Plumbers get a second shot at saving the day after missed mission
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: HBO’s new miniseries, ‘White House Plumbers’, is a story based on true events and a satirical approach to the lives of two men who led former President Richard Nixon’s vision to outsmart his opponents and win the re-election campaign. The task at hand for the men who were coined as the "Plumbers" was eventually to gather information on the Democrats, Nixon’s opponents, and use that information in the President’s favor to make him win again. Only the ways adopted by the Plumbers were closer to the lines of espionage, infiltrations, bugging, and misinformation to discredit the Democrats.
Created by Peter Huyck and Alex Gregory who were also responsible for bringing another political satire named ‘Veep’ to life on HBO, their new offering ‘White House Plumbers’ charts the lives of E Howard Hunt (Woody Harrelson) and Gordon Liddy (Justin Theroux) as they attempt to break into the Watergate offices of the Democratic National Committee and the events leading up to and following it. The pilot episode gives us a glimpse of the lives of Hunt and Liddy and their apparent failure as a team in their first undercover assignment. Hunt and Liddy seem to be an example of a bad marriage, but then, the President wants to get a job done and Hunt and Liddy desperately wait in line to make their name. The opening image of the show sets the tone as it displays the Plumbers’ second attempt to break into Watergate, denoting that multiple failed attempts were made before the actual break-in happened on June 17, 1972.
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The first episode saw Hunt and Liddy being called to the Executive office branch of the White House by Egil Bud Krogh, the Deputy Assistant to President for Domestic Affairs for fixing the confidential leaks emanating from the White House to the press. Daniel Ellsberg, a former military analyst, had leaked the Pentagon Papers to the press, making President Nixon extremely furious. Hunt and Liddy were tasked to stop the leaks and find a way to discredit Ellsberg. Hunt, a CIA agent played by Harrelson, comes across as a loud-mouthed, chirpy man who fights tooth and nail to keep the name of his agency clean. He comes up with the idea of breaking into Ellsberg’s psychiatrist’s office in Los Angeles, to find evidence of Ellsberg being a communist with ties to Russia and China, hence discrediting all that Ellsberg had done to date.
Liddy played by a moustache-heavy Theroux is on board with the plan and the duo is given a green light from Bud to conduct the operation. Hunt calls a bunch of Cubans to break into Ellsberg’s psychiatrist's office but fails to find any file with Ellsberg’s name in the office of the psychiatrist. Instead, the three Cubans that Hunt brought for the job, make a mess of the psychiatrist’s office. The operation goes for a toss and Liddy is furious with the Cubans that Hunt brought for the job. When Liddy and Hunt return to Washington DC, they are immediately fired by John Dean, the White House Counsel, but are offered new jobs as members of the committee to reelect President Nixon. Surprisingly, when Liddy asks for budget constraints for this reelection job, Dean happily replies that they can have as much money as they want.
Unique blend of satire and seriousness
Diving deep into a political scandal with drama is a tool used over and again on television. What ‘White House Plumbers’ has managed to do well is to play on the eccentricity of its characters who even though existed in real life in tabloids due to the Watergate scandal, come across as sillier and more prone to making mistakes just like any other person. Hunt is at Liddy’s throat when he calls ‘Black ops’ as ‘Black bags’ since the FBI refers to undercover operations as black bags. Liddy, who works for the government, listens to speeches of Adolf Hitler for inspiration which baffles Hunt. At the time of the crucial break-in of Ellsberg’s psychiatrist's office, the walkie-talkies that Liddy brought do not work, adding to the chaos.
Both Hunt and Liddy’s first interaction is a total power grab since Liddy mentions that he’s head of the Special Intelligence Unit (SIU) made at the White House to fix the leaks. Hunt tries to undermine his authority, but the duo finally gets along after a whimsical conversation. However, the duo agrees on one thing — renaming SIU as the Plumbers because that’s what Hunt and Liddy believe they do, i.e. fix leaks.
Tune in to watch ‘White House Plumbers’ new episodes on HBO every Monday.