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This is Fresh Air, I'm Terry Gross, the Murdoch family and the global media giant they created are the subjects of the new

documentary series, The Murdoch's Empire of Influence.

It's streaming on CNN's new streaming service CNN Plus and will later be shown on CNN.

It's a collaboration between CNN and The New York Times and is based on a lengthy investigative article from 2019

by Times reporters Jonathan Moller and my guest, Jim Routenberg, who are consulting producers for the documentary series.

They write,

few private citizens have ever been more central to the state of world affairs than Rupert Murdoch.

As the head of a sprawling global media empire,

he commanded multiple TV networks, a global news service, a major publishing house, and a Hollywood movie studio.

More than any single media company, Murdoch's company enabled, promoted and profited from the right wing populist wave,

not just in the US but in countries around the world.

Routenberg and Moller's reporting is also about the infighting between Murdoch's children over who would succeed the patriarch.

That part of the story is a lot like the story in HBO's fictional series Succession, but without the comedy.

Jim Routenberg is now a writer at large for The New York Times and The Sunday Magazine.

He was previously the media columnist, a White House reporter, and a national political correspondent.

Jim Routenberg, welcome back to Fresh Air.

So the story that you wrote in The New York Times and the CNN documentary series

began with Murdoch at the age of 86.

He's on his son, Locklands, luxurious sailboat, went on the way to the bathroom.

He trips, falls, seriously injures his spine, and his life is in jeopardy.

...