This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
In a toxic political environment featuring constant attacks and counterattacks, "Frontline" on PBS does something very different.
Its quadrennial report "The Choice" takes the time to look into the lives of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump — to tell voters how they came to be the people they are today.
"In all the presidencies I've ever covered, going back to Jimmy Carter, I've never been in a more divisive environment," said "Frontline" filmmaker Michael Kirk. "I have this feeling, honestly, that if I do my job right … the people who hate Hillary Clinton might not hate her as much — might begin to understand her. And the same with Donald Trump."
"The Choice: 2016" (Tuesday, 8 p.m., PBS/Ch. 7) is Kirk's fourth. In addition to the Obama-Romney, Obama-McCain, Bush-Kerry and Bush-Gore versions of "The Choice," Kirk's more than 200 "Frontline" films include "League of Denial," "Gunned Down" and "The Secret History of ISIS."
"The Choice" is two hourlong biographies woven together in alternating segments that Kirk and his team blend together masterfully.
"You really get to know the candidate through the people who know them — their families, their friends, old compatriots," Kirk said.
The parallel biographies begin with two pivotal events: President Obama humiliating Trump over the birther issue at the 2011 White House Correspondents Dinner and Clinton taking charge and fighting back when her husband was defeated for re-election as governor of Arkansas in 1980. Kirk builds from there.
This is not the kind of reporting you generally see on TV. There may be some last-minute tweaks to "The Choice," which airs a day after the first Clinton-Trump debate. But it's not about "grabbing headlines," said Kirk, who called it the "anti-news" that's about more than just the election horse race.
"There are others doing that, and Godspeed to them," Kirk said. "We're more about the why did things happen? Who are they? How will they lead?
"If I took your life story and went back to your kindergarten friends and came all the way up to now, I would know a lot about you that wouldn't have anything to do with news breaking."
"The Choice" touches on the difficult relationship between Trump, his older brother, Fred Jr., and their father, Fred Sr. — a relationship that may have contributed to what happened to Fred Jr., "who died an alcoholic and a broken man at 41."
It touches on how Trump was sent off to military school, where he learned about relationships with women from Playboy magazine.
It touches on what it was like for Clinton to grow up with a father whose reaction to her top grades was to comment that it must be a very easy school.
The Clinton portion of the program reports that Hillary made national news as a college student before she ever met Bill. It delves into how she repeatedly came to the rescue of her husband when sexual scandals threatened to derail his career — and his presidency.
"She's a fighter," Kirk said. "She fought for Bill. She fought for their relationship. She fought to get to where she [is]. And that's amazing."
"The Choice" wants viewers to see "history through a different set of eyes," said executive producer Raney Aronson-Rath. "It's been really intriguing to see how these moments that we all think we know so well haven't been [told from] her point of view. … It helps you understand her better. And the same is true for Trump."
"The Choice" shows viewers "Bill Clinton through Hillary Clinton's eyes," Kirk said. As told by her close friends, that is.
This includes what Mrs. Clinton was doing while President Clinton was addressing the nation after he was acquitted by the Senate on impeachment charges — she was upstairs in the White House planning a run for the U.S. Senate.
"I found early, early indications of a secrecy penchant," Kirk said. That came from "the way the family dynamic worked" at the Rodham home; continued in her work on the Watergate committee; and worked its way "all the way up to the things that you and I know about the scandals" — real and imagined — during the Bill Clinton administration.
At the same time, "The rise, the fall and the rise of Donald Trump is an amazing thing to witness," Kirk said. "And it's been amazing to chronicle."
He added, "I take great delight in telling a story that you think you know, connecting a couple dots you think you know in a different way, twisting it up, turning it over, coming at it from a slightly different angle."
Including how Roy Cohn, who was Sen. Joe McCarthy's chief lieutenant in the anti-communist witch hunts of the 1950s, became Trump's lawyer and mentor — turning him into a confrontational "bulldog" who attacked people, never admitted mistakes and claimed victory in defeat.
There's a good deal of focus on the tabloid scandal that ensued when Trump cheated on his first wife with his second wife, although there's very little about his second divorce and third wife.
Another segment outlines how Trump's reality show "The Apprentice" changed him from a "punchline" to a credible businessman, even though the truth was something quite different — it's clearly demonstrated that he's not the great businessman he claims to be.
" 'The Apprentice' became "a bigger and more important part of the film than I expected it would be until I started to interview people," Kirk said. Until he "talked to people who say it was positively designed to be presidential."
This is the kind of reporting you're not going to see on the nightly news or on the 24-hour news channels.
"My guess is, and my hope is, that tons of people will be hungry for this kind of longer view," Aronson-Rath said.
Kirk said he believes Americans are tired of "the noise" that surrounds the daily news coverage of the race.
"It's our bet that they're going to want to dive into something more substantive so that they can evaluate the noise as it comes in October and early November," he said.
Twitter: @ScottDPierce —
On TV
"Frontline's" two-hour film "The Choice: 2016" airs Tuesday at 8 p.m. on PBS/Ch. 7.
It repeats Thursday, Sept. 29, at 2 a.m.; and Sunday, Oct. 2 at 1 a.m. and 3 p.m.