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In the early 1980s, Australian media mogul, Rupert Murdoch, bought one of Boston's two big dailies, The Herald, and he made some

changes. People say, oh, God, Murdoch, that was, that was fun. Frank Phillips was a reporter there.

That was real fun journalism. These guys, was Australian accents. I'd uh, you know, we got a budget story here.

The governor, uh, I can get a piece of, before it comes out, we get a scoop.

And they said, Frank, Frank, fuck the budgets.

He says, uh, we want you to, we want you to stir up the animals.

We don't need budget stories.

That was the Murdoch mandate.

Go out and stir up the animals. And I said,

OK. Phillips was a politics reporter. He wasn't going to file splashy stories about mob hits or the

latest meltdown of the Boston Red Sox.

But he had faith that in this town, the world of politics could be just as stirring.

He told me that every morning he'd drive in from the suburbs. And just as he crested the hill in Belmont and beheld the city below, Phillips thought about the scene in Roger Rabbit

when the investigator character first enters Tune Town.

A red curtain lifts, and suddenly the world comes to life in absurd cartoonish color.

Boston was Tune Town.

The politicians were the tunes, and Phillips was here to tell their stories.

The more scandalous, the better.

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