Hi everyone and thank you for tuning in to the 20th episode of Awards Chatter,

the Hollywood Reporters Awards Podcast. I'm the host Scott Feinberg, and on this episode I am so very honored to be joined by Dan Rather, one of the greatest TV newsmen in the history of the business. He spent 44 years at CBS News,

eventually rising to the anchor chair that was occupied before him by Walter

Cronkite. He also worked at 60 Minutes and 60 Minutes 2, where in 2004 a segment that he reported about George

W Bush's National Guard Service caused a considerable amount of controversy and led CBS to effectively push him out the door.

The story of what Rather reported in partnership with his longtime producer Mary Maipse

is the subject of a new film called Truth in which rather is played by Robert

Redford and Mapes is played by Kate Blanchett. The film which is the

directorial debut of James Vanderbilt looks into how they came to the story and how others responded

to it and ask many questions about the state of journalism today.

It's caused plenty of controversy and debates since its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in September where I saw it and

Rather somewhat surprisingly to me and others has not been shy about engaging in the resulting conversations.

But before we talk any further about Rather and what he experienced and what he thinks about it,

let's first quickly recap what's happened in the world of awards since our last episode, as we always do.

To begin with everyone, and I mean everyone, is talking about Star Wars, The Force Awakens,

J.J. Abrams' film, which has just dominated at the box office since it's midnight

screenings on Thursday night going into Friday and throughout the entire opening weekend,

making a record-breaking $248 million over the weekend and continuing to go strong since.

I'm not sure I want to be concussion or joy which are slated to open on Christmas against Star Wars

because even in its second weekend it looks like it may continue to go very

strong the hateful 8 and the revenant meanwhile are going to be opening in limited release

on Friday before expanding in the weeks to come speaking of the the hatefully and the Revenant, it will be interesting to see if and if so to what degree their box office takes are impacted by the fact that screeners of them have been leaked online.

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