Movie Nights with the Reagans

by Mark Weinberg

  Haig had even organized a private screening in Washington before the movie hit theaters. Several prominent figures in the defense and intelligence establishments attended, including General Edward Rowny, Reagan’s chief negotiator on the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) between the United States and the Soviet Union. First proposed by President Reagan in 1982, the treaty limited and reduced strategic offensive arms. Signed in 1991, it went into effect in 1994. Also on hand was former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director Admiral Stansfield Turner; and former ambassador to the Soviet Union Walter Stoessel, who had also served in Reagan’s State Department. At a reception before the screening, Rowny said he came out of loyalty to Haig and didn’t know what the movie was about. When informed, he winced and said, “I hope he doesn’t get me in trouble here,” adding, “I want to go back and negotiate with the Soviets.” Stoessel, before going into the screening, said he’d heard the movie was “a slam-bang thing,” and commented, “I hope the good guys win.”XXX

  After the movie, however, the foreign policy experts had less to say. Turner refused to speak to a Washington Post reporter on the scene, and Stoessel said simply, “It makes you think.” Rowny called the movie “provocative” and made clear he wasn’t saying anything more: “I’m going to be diplomatic. Silence is golden, and I’m going to glitter.”XXXI

  Reagan watched Red Dawn at an interesting point in US-Soviet relations. He was in the midst of the 1984 reelection campaign, and committed to maintaining the strong stance against the Soviet Union that he had promised the American people in 1980 and held to throughout his first term. The year before, in 1983, he had referred to the USSR as an “evil empire” and announced plans for the Strategic Defense Initiative, later dubbed “Star Wars.” He aimed to show the Russians that the United States meant to win the Cold War.

  The very day of the Red Dawn screening, Reagan met at the White House with Secretary of State George Shultz to discuss a dramatic prospect: an upcoming meeting with Soviet foreign minister Andrei Gromyko, who would be in the United States later in September for the United Nations General Assembly session. That afternoon, as Reagan noted in his diary, it was “off to Camp David.”XXXII

  But not without first facing the usual gauntlet of reporters gathered to witness his departure from the White House. The rest and relaxation (and Red Dawn) would have to wait. As we made our way to the helicopter on the South Lawn at about three thirty that afternoon, the press bombarded Reagan with questions. They asked him about his planned appointment of Edwin Meese III to serve as attorney general and about some comments made by Walter Mondale on the campaign trail. “Do you think that God is a Republican, as Mondale charges?” To that, Reagan responded, “I have no answer to any of those things that what’s-his-name said.” He did banter with the reporters about the nature of religion and politics but soon continued toward Marine One. Among the last questions shouted after him were “Will you meet with Gromyko? Are you going to try to meet with Gromyko?”XXXIII The president kept the answer to himself. That evening, we watched Red Dawn in his cabin.

  The next day, September 8, Reagan noted, was a “beautiful day.” He took one of his beloved horseback rides around the mountain trails. He also delivered his “radio talk”: this week, on education. When Reagan commented in his speech that “violence and disorder have no place in our schools,” I wonder if he might have been thinking of the violence and disorder the high school resistance fighters had got up to in the previous night’s movie.XXXIV

  On Monday the 9th, instead of returning directly to the White House, the president took the helicopter north to Doylestown, Pennsylvania, to speak at a Polish-American festival held at the National Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa. He gave a rousing speech to a crowd that he later recorded as forty thousand.XXXV The throng consisted mostly of Polish Americans whose ancestral homes had been overtaken by the Communists. Reagan’s language was strong:

  “Our country’s days of apologizing are over. America is standing tall again, and don’t let anyone tell you we’re any less dedicated to peace because we want a strong America. I’ve known four wars—four wars—in my lifetime, and not one of them came about because we were too strong. Weakness is the greatest enemy of peace.”XXXVI

  The New York Times might have described this language the same way it described Red Dawn: “incorrigibly gung-ho.” But the audience loved it. A few lines later, the president was interrupted by chants of “Four more years!”

  Two days later, on September 11, President Reagan announced to the press that he would meet with Foreign Minister Gromyko later in the month. They met first in New York, and later had a three-and-a-half-hour discussion in Washington. It was the first high-level meeting with a Soviet official of Reagan’s presidency. Some reporters noted that the announcement came just after Reagan had watched the stridently anti-Communist Red Dawn and reiterated his commitment to peace through strength in Pennsylvania. Even before his later successes with Gorbachev, Reagan knew that strength and diplomacy were not mutually exclusive. He also knew how to keep everyone guessing.

  After one Friday night screening in Aspen of a movie that featured Communists—it may have been Red Dawn, but I can’t be certain—we had our usual discussion at the fireplace. I spoke up and said something that sounded a bit “un-American.” What it was and why I said it, I cannot recall, but it caused the president to quip, “You sound like those Communists in the movie we just saw.” I smiled sheepishly and said, “I think he just painted me red.”

  Everyone, including the president and I, had a good laugh. I went back to my cabin, off to bed, and didn’t give the incident a second thought. During the president’s radio address at Laurel Lodge the next day, everything was as usual. Good moods all around. But that night in Aspen, when the entire group gathered for the Saturday evening movie, the president spoke up.

  “Say, last night I said something silly about Mark and Communists,” he said to everyone. “I’m sorry if I implied he had the wrong ideas. Of course he doesn’t. He’s part of the family.” I was touched but mystified. I hadn’t been bothered at all by the joking the night before, and I hoped the president wasn’t either. We all then took our seats and settled in for the weekend’s second screening.

  After the movie ended and the lights came up, I walked over to Mrs. Reagan and said in a low voice, “That was so nice of the president to say, but he did not need to at all. I was fine.” She replied, “I know, but Ronnie felt very bad about it.” I asked her why he did not mention it at the radio address earlier, and she explained, “We talked about that, but he thought it was important to say it in front of the whole group.”

  Of course he didn’t think I was some kind of Communist. Casual banter like that was part of the fun of movie nights. But it showed how seriously Reagan took the Communist threat that he went out of his way to explain himself. Communism was no joke for a man whose job it was to go toe-to-toe with the Soviets. And it showed how much both Reagans cared about doing right by their people—by those who were, as he kindly called me, “part of the family.”

  13

  TOP GUN

  Starring:

  Tom Cruise, Kelly McGillis, Val Kilmer

  Directed by:

  Tony Scott

  Viewed by the Reagans:

  May 30, 1986

  The Film That Became a Touchstone for the Reagan Years

  As I left my office on the thirty-fourth floor of the Fox Plaza building in Los Angeles and rode the elevator down to the entrance to greet Ronald Reagan’s guest, I wasn’t sure what to expect. Since leaving the White House in January 1989, Reagan had returned to California and established his postpresidential office in Fox Plaza. This gleaming, barely two-year-old, thirty-five-story building in Century City had already earned its own place in movie history by this point; some might know it better as “Nakatomi Plaza,” the setting of the 1988 action thriller Die Hard. A big part of its appeal was its proximity to the Reagans’ Los Angeles residence, less than
fifteen minutes away by car. The Reagans had come full circle, returning to live and work in this city that had been the scene of some of their earliest successes and most important events in their lives—not just their careers on the screen but also their meeting and falling in love with each other. The Reagans felt at home in Los Angeles and comfortable in the buzzing, celebrity-packed atmosphere.

  I, on the other hand, a kid from Ohio, considered myself lucky to be there. It seemed like only yesterday that Ken Duberstein, then White House chief of staff, called me one day in the summer of 1988 and asked if I would be interested in going to Los Angeles as director of public affairs in Ronald Reagan’s office once he’d left Washington. I was both stunned and thrilled. Like everyone else on the White House staff, I had been polishing my resume as the end of the Reagan presidency loomed. I told Ken I would love to do that, but he made no promises. A couple of weeks later, one weekend at Camp David, as we were sitting in the conference room in Laurel Lodge for the president’s weekly radio address, Mrs. Reagan turned to me and said, “Ronnie and I are so happy that you will be coming with us to Los Angeles.” That was that. The job of public affairs director entailed being spokesman, speechwriter, media advisor, and personal aide. (I found out years later that the Reagans had asked Ken to approach me about the job, because they did not want any awkwardness if I turned out not to be interested.)

  Unlike the Reagans, I was new to Los Angeles’s celebrity culture, but I was trying to learn fast. And this day was promising to be quite an education. The individual I was on my way to greet was one of the biggest stars in Hollywood.

  Perhaps that’s why I was a bit surprised when an ordinary-looking SUV pulled up in front of the building, and Tom Cruise hopped out of the driver’s seat. He was recognizable, of course, with his hair parted and that famous smile. He had no chauffeur, no security, and no entourage, and was wearing a dark suit and tie to meet my boss.

  I introduced myself, and he was as friendly as I had hoped. I told him my name as we shook hands, and he said, “And I’m Tom.” “Yes, I knew that,” I said. He chuckled. We walked to the elevator and rode it to the floor on which the former president’s office was.

  The idea to get these two stars together was born from an ongoing conversation among former president Reagan’s staff, helped by Mrs. Reagan. Once we set up the LA office, she, the chief of staff Fred Ryan, and I tossed around ideas for interesting and fun things for the erstwhile chief executive to do, to liven up the staid duties that often typified the careers of past presidents.

  One idea that appealed to all of us was that Reagan should get to know modern Hollywood. After all, he was an elder statesman not only of the United States but of Tinseltown. And we knew he would be interested in getting to know his successors as movie stars, as well as learn how the motion picture business had evolved. Cruise, one of the biggest stars of the 1980s, seemed an ideal person to approach. Reagan not only knew who he was, but also he had enjoyed watching Cruise’s 1986 blockbuster Top Gun at Camp David several years ago, despite some interruptions.

  I was unable to make the trip to Camp David on the weekend in the spring of 1986 when Top Gun was shown. Denny Brisley, a colleague in the White House Press Office, took my place. Since graduating from Stanford University in 1982, she had worked at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), the largest office within the president’s Executive Office, before joining the White House press staff in 1985. Denny had also recently joined the US Navy Reserve and was celebrating her twenty-sixth birthday the day she took off with the Reagans for Camp David on Friday, May 30—her first time filling in on this trip. It promised to be an eventful birthday weekend.

  Also on board Marine One that day was Commander Vivien Crea of the US Coast Guard, the first woman to serve as a presidential military aide. As the chopper thundered over the National Mall, Commander Crea, the “football” case containing the nuclear launch codes held in her grasp, leaned over to the president and made a special request. She asked if Marine One could divert from the usual flight path to Camp David and fly over the Coast Guard headquarters at Buzzard Point on the Anacostia River in southwest Washington, DC.

  Crea, who would go on to become vice commandant of the Coast Guard, explained that their headquarters was getting a special visit that day. The Coast Guard cutter Eagle, a nearly three-hundred-foot sailing vessel used as a training ship for cadets, was docked there on a visit from the US Coast Guard Academy in New London, Connecticut. The president liked the idea, and the pilots altered course for the southwest waterfront. When the brilliant white vessel with its three high masts and familiar Coast Guard emblem came into view, the helicopter began to circle as the president and Mrs. Reagan waved down at the cadets (who were no doubt surprised to be buzzed by Marine One). Rex, the Reagans’ yappy and annoying Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, barked at the window.

  Although a committed navy woman herself, Denny Brisley was proud of the salute to her fellow seafaring service members. After that detour, it was on to Maryland.

  As the presidential pilot lowered the helicopter to land at Camp David, Brisley watched from the window as the presidential flag was raised to welcome the president. It hit the top of the staff just as Marine One touched down. One of her fellow naval officers greeted the president with a salute as the party disembarked. As it turned out, there was still more to come to stir Ensign Brisley’s navy pride that weekend.

  From the helicopter, the staff party transferred to the small motorcade of nondescript silver Chrysler sedans that would ferry them to their cabins. As everyone was getting in, President Reagan turned to Brisley and asked if she would care to join them for a movie later that evening. She had hoped this invitation was coming, but she knew the routine. You didn’t just “show up” for movie night in Aspen; the Reagans had to invite you.

  “Thank you, Mr. President, I would be delighted,” she replied. “What are we going to watch?”

  Brisley remembered that Reagan responded with a smile and a wink. “We are watching Top Gun,” he said. He was clearly excited, and so was the young press aide and naval officer who was set to join him.

  Top Gun had been out for only about two weeks, and already it was proving wildly popular. On its opening weekend, it brought in more than $8 million and shot to number one at the box office. Critics praised the action scenes but scoffed at some of the dialogue and story lines. No matter, it would become the top movie of 1986.I

  The film centers on fliers at the US Navy’s Fighter Weapons School, known informally as Top Gun, where the best aviators in the naval ranks receive advanced training. It opens with a tense aerial encounter in the skies above the Indian Ocean between F-14 Tomcat fighters from the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise and hostile jets from a never-identified country (but bearing a Communist red star). Lieutenant Pete Mitchell, played by Tom Cruise and known by his call sign “Maverick,” performs a daring maneuver, managing to invert his F-14 above the enemy aircraft and give its pilot a less-than-diplomatic middle finger. The incident ends without gunfire, but the top pilot in Maverick’s squadron cracks from the pressure of the encounter.

  Maverick and his radio intercept officer, Lieutenant Junior Grade Nick “Goose” Bradshaw, played by Anthony Edwards, become the squadron’s top team, earning them a trip to Top Gun fighter pilot school, then located at Miramar Naval Air Station in California. They are sent off with a warning from their commander, who is well aware of the recklessness that earned Maverick his call sign. These include “a history of high-speed passes over five air control towers and one admiral’s daughter.”

  At Top Gun, Maverick and Goose rival another hotshot team of fliers in their class, “Iceman” and “Slider,” played by Val Kilmer and Rick Rossovich. Their instructors, “Viper” and “Jester” (Tom Skerritt and Michael Ironside), recognize Maverick’s natural talent but try to tame his headstrong tendencies. After one training flight that didn’t end well, Jester remarks that Maverick displayed “some of the best flying I’ve seen t
o date—right up to the part where you got killed.” To further complicate things, Maverick falls for Charlotte Blackwood, a civilian air combat analyst attached to Top Gun (and bearing her own call sign, “Charlie”), played by Kelly McGillis.

  Viper, the older instructor, holds a key to the secret that drives Maverick to fly the way he does: the unresolved disappearance of his father, also a naval aviator, during the Vietnam War. Maverick’s “need for speed” eventually takes its toll, leading to tragic consequences. He must face the question of whether he has what it takes to fly with the best at Top Gun. And in the film’s gripping final dogfight, when the black jets emblazoned with red stars are menacing a disabled American ship, he must rely on both his Top Gun training and his natural risk-taking instincts to survive.

  Top Gun was made with the full cooperation of the US Navy, and real pilots performed the flying sequences. Dozens of naval aviators were thanked by name, including their call signs, in the credits for their help in making the film. The coordination wasn’t always easy. In one instance, when director Tony Scott was filming on an aircraft carrier, he realized the lighting would look better if the ship was traveling in a different direction. Informed that the effort to turn the massive vessel would cost $25,000, Scott cut a check then and there.II

  The US Navy received a return for its efforts. Enlistment booths set up outside theaters showing the movie across the country led to a surge in recruitment, especially for the aviation program. One recruiting officer in Los Angeles told the Associated Press, “I’ve asked several of these individuals if they’ve seen the movie and if that’s why they came down to talk to us again, and they’ve said ‘yes.’ ” Another recruiter reported that her offices had received more than twice their usual number of phone calls in the weeks since Top Gun came out. When they interviewed applicants, “about ninety percent said they had seen the movie.”III