From: Tom B Whiteside (email suppressed)
Date: Fri Dec 14 2007 - 07:29:40 PST
This description of "Tearoom" reminds me of another surveillance movie. I
was in Washington DC summer of 1990 when the FBI busted mayor Marion
Berry. The 30 seconds that made it onto national television was him
smoking crack and getting busted - the other 89.5 minutes or so (that's
right, it's a feature) consists of him hanging out in her hotel room
trying to get her to have sex with him. (I forgot her name, his friend,
the sting - she was voted "Worst Hostess" at the end of the year by one of
the DC lifestyle magazines.) She retreats to the bathroom and tells him to
smoke crack. He does, the FBI busts through the door and arrests him and
takes his blood pressure. I'm not kidding.
Best moment - early on, she walks all the way across the room towards the
hidden camera and moves a chair that was partially blocking the shot. It
was a Hitchcock moment in documentary - "no, don't do that, he'll know
something's up!!!" But it passes.
The smoke-and-bust clip was broadcast on the evening news, then the whole
thing was broadcast late that night, I don't remember which station. I
stayed up to watch it. Do I now wish that I had been able to videotape
that show that night? You bet.
- Whiteside
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