MediaMaker Spotlight

September 5: Inside the Day of Terror That Changed Live TV

Women in Film and Video (DC) Episode 88

In this episode, host Candice Bloch has a brief chat with Director Tim Fehlbaum and actors Leonie Benesch and Ben Chaplin of the film September 5. They talk about some of what went into producing the film, which unveils the decisive moment that forever changed media coverage and continues to impact live news today. Set during the 1972 Munich Summer Olympics, the film follows the ABC Sports broadcasting team who quickly shifted from sports reporting to live coverage of the Israeli athletes taken hostage. Through this lens, September 5 provides an important perspective on the live broadcast seen globally by millions of people at the time.

At the heart of the story is Geoff (played by John Magaro), a young and ambitious producer striving to prove himself to his boss, the legendary TV executive Roone Arledge (played by Peter Sarsgaard). Together with German interpreter Marianne (played by Leonie Benesch) and his mentor Marvin Bader (played by Ben Chaplin), the story focuses on the intricate details of the high-tech broadcast capabilities of the time, juxtaposed against the many lives at stake and the moral decisions that needed to be made against an impossible ticking clock.

Paramount Pictures’ “SEPTEMBER 5” is a ‘Best Motion Picture - Drama’ nominee for the 2025 Golden Globes. The film is in select theaters on December 13, 2024, and opens Nationwide on January 17, 2025.

https://www.september5movie.com/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_5_(film)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt28082769/

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00:02 - VO (Host)
Quiet on the set All together Action. 

00:10 - VO (Host)
Welcome to Media Maker Spotlight from Women in Film and Video in Washington DC. We bring you conversations with industry professionals for behind-the-screens insight and inspiration. 

00:24 - Candice Bloch (Host)
Thanks for joining us. I'm your host, candice Block, and in this episode we're going to learn about the film September 5. The film unveils the decisive moment that forever changed media coverage and continues to impact live news today. Set during the 1972 Munich Summer Olympics, the film follows the ABC sports broadcasting team, who quickly shifted from sports reporting to live coverage of the Israeli athletes taken hostage. Through this lens, September 5 provides an important perspective on the live broadcasts seen globally by millions of people at the time. 

00:56
At the heart of the story is Jeff, played by John Magaro, a young and ambitious producer striving to prove himself to his boss, the legendary TV executive Rune Arledge, played by Peter Sarsgaard, together with German interpreter Marianne, played by Leonie Benesch, and his mentor Marvin Bader, played by Ben Chaplin. 

01:14
The story focuses on the intricate details of the high-tech broadcast capabilities of the time, juxtaposed against the many lives at stake and the moral decisions that needed to be made against an impossible ticking clock. I was able to speak briefly with director Tim Fellbaum and actors Leonie Benesch and Ben Chaplin during a recent press junket for the film. Please enjoy our short conversation about September 5. So, as I was saying before, I'm with Women in Film and Video, and our podcast, media Maker Spotlight, is about screen-based media production. So because we focus on that, I wanted to dive right in and ask about the early 70s live broadcast studio setup in this film and I was curious if any of you found any of the technological elements or limitations of how they got stuff done particularly interesting or something you hadn't even thought of. 

02:07 - Leonie Benesch (Guest)
I loved the editing tables. I thought they were so cool. If I had more space in my flat I would put one up. 

02:13 - Tim Fellbaum (Guest)
They're beautiful and also, I look like a crash course, didn't I, in how to edit, which made me feel very grown up. You are, yeah, thanks. Do I look grown up or not? But that's Tim, that's Tim, that's all the way there for me. 

02:30 - Ben Chaplin (Guest)
I'm not sure if I got the question right. 

02:32 - Leonie Benesch (Guest)
Did you love any? 

02:33 - Candice Bloch (Host)
Was there anything about you know how the equipment and the technology, for example, like how they did the overlays and the limitations of film and satellites and things like that? 

02:42 - Ben Chaplin (Guest)
Everything about that fascinated me. I think that also I hope that comes across in the movie that we are very interested in that work. Two reasons One, of course, is the aesthetics that we want it to feel real right and we wanted us to make sure that many people who actually experience these controls will see the movie. That it feels accurate. That's the one thing. But then from a scene, from the point of view of the topic of the movie also, it seemed really relevant to us that this is in a time where we have such a complex and rapidly evolving media environment. It is interesting for the audience to maybe see how, back then, an image found its way from being taken to the TV. 

03:33 - Candice Bloch (Host)
For sure. Yeah, that's one of the things that personally, I found most fascinating, coming from sort of that world and we've spoken on our show to people that do the live broadcasting now so it's fascinating to see how things are so different. I thought it was really cool seeing you, know, fighting for the satellite time and all that. 

03:50 - Leonie Benesch (Guest)
My mind was blown when I read that. 

03:51 - Ben Chaplin (Guest)
Just to give you the complete answer. It seems like I love the little blackboard where she puts up the letters, the title, the title generates, so to say, at the back. 

04:03 - Candice Bloch (Host)
Yeah, and that 100, 100 stayed with me. I was like, wow, I still don't entirely get it, but it's really cool to see how they do that I also like the ingenuity you know, or a phone to wireless, to walkie, so it's sort of fiddled with the radio, take it apart, yeah so macgyver like yeah now, but just you know cutting edge. 

04:24 - Ben Chaplin (Guest)
The limitations force creativity right yes exactly, and they had to improvise on that day very much on many, many levels, and the biggest improvisation, of course, in a way, is that it was a crew of sports people that suddenly had to make the switch to reporting on a project. 

04:39 - Candice Bloch (Host)
So the events of the film, and especially Ben's character, point out that tension between the network competition of wanting to report first and the credibility of having at least two confirmed sources. Ben, can you elaborate on what it meant to be one of those voices advocating for getting news correct and not worrying as much about the speed? Sure. 

04:59 - Tim Fellbaum (Guest)
I mean, I, I a little bit, I just in terms of what Marvin and what happens in the film, I think it was, they were improvising. It wasn't something that as sports people I don't think that they'd really considered and all that it had really happened before you know, or asking live a major incident, a terrorist incident. So they were sort of once they made the decision to broadcast live, I think that they were sort of trying to dunk on their feet about possible consequences. But it seems to me in the film that Marvin was the person who was trying to provide sort of checks and balances, I suppose. But actually he's not sure either. He's questioning it while they're doing it. The others almost are too busy because they're actually producing it, directing it, as it were. But then I guess because in his role as chief of operations it was his job, I suppose, to see potential pitfalls and what could go wrong. So I think it was more in his. I think they were so busy doing it that there was very little time to think about. What do you think? 

06:19 - Ben Chaplin (Guest)
Yeah, that's also what Jeffrey Mason told us, the character that John Magaro plays. They were so busy covering what was happening right next to them so that they didn't have any time to think about consequences. Yeah, so, as you mentioned, marvin Bader, I just want to make sure that also that spreading of that rumor, that you know that it's not clear what the process was. That was a really complex thing. That originated not at ABC Sports, that was already on German television. 

06:58 - Candice Bloch (Host)
Yeah, no for sure. I mean it's definitely a very dramatic moment as well. So Marvin Bader is a real person. Many of the people in this film are real people. So, as the film's director, can you maybe speak about the responsibility of portraying real historical events with respect and accuracy, but also maybe explain some elements that perhaps had to be fictionalized for narrative flow of a film? 

07:23 - Ben Chaplin (Guest)
Yes, that's a good question and the question, of course, that we were dealing a lot with in every stage of the production and in writing, in shooting, in editing always the question. We had, of course, the ambition to stay as truthful as possible. We did a lot of research and, of course, as one really important source also, we had our tapes. See what they did send. We had resources, or talked to Jeffrey Mason, we talked to a runner, Jimmy Shashlock he was one of these people who smothered the elephant. 

07:58 - Candice Bloch (Host)
Another technical limitation. 

08:00 - Ben Chaplin (Guest)
We talked to Sean McManus, the son of Jim McKay, who was there as a teenager during the Olympics and also was there during that night, and then we had biographies that we could read about. This Rune has a biography, I guess, of Jeff Garnier, Jim McKay has. But then, on the other hand, what we did, it's still a movie, so we have to tell it in 90 minutes. So condensation, obviously, is something that we really have to do and, for example, with Joe McGuire's character, Jeffrey Mason, you have to combine certain functions that multiple people would have in real life and the same we want to have for Leonie. We had some we heard about translators that were there. So we took some elements from reality but then also created the correct character for the movie. 

08:55 - Candice Bloch (Host)
Yeah, and that seems you know kind of what has to happen to make amalgamations of people, to move things along. So since your character was one, I want to go to you. Sid Leone, your character is critically important to the ABC team. As the events unfold, Can you speak a bit about portraying the only German and German speaker, and also one of the only women there as well, and then having to be so critically important and crucial and needed for everything throughout? 

09:21 - Leonie Benesch (Guest)
Yeah, sure. So the thing is, if you sure, she is important, but that is not something that I play. You know, the task for me as an actor is where's the obstacles? Oh, she, I don't know, wants to translate but she can't hear, so she'll scream. That's the bit that I can. That's fun for me to play with as an actor, but I can't really play generational guilt. 

09:45
I know, as a German, what it means to have been raised in a country that has committed atrocities and has tried to face them. I know what that means and there's a certain I personally have. Yeah, I have something I can tap into for that, but that's not. That doesn't lend itself very well in terms of an acting exercise, that is kind of there, because you and Moritz Binder, your co-writer, wrote that into the script. You know that's already there. And in terms of being the only woman on set, I again I love the writing because you know it's a little feminist rebellion. You know because it's a really beautiful appreciation for the fact that usually there are lots of women involved and they don't get credit. And I love the scene with the coffee because it has an immediate, there's a punchline to it and you know Mariana gets to be the person who saves the day a lot of the time. So I really. But she doesn't feel shoehorned in, I think. So that's really beautiful. 

10:49 - Candice Bloch (Host)
Yeah, I really loved her character. I mean because it's, you know, there is that's so common, just being assumed, especially in 72. We've made progress still plenty to go, but we've made progress since then. So it was really satisfying to have that kind of seeing how everyone just had to respect you and needed you so much. So the events that the film portray span nearly 22 hours straight. Did you film in sequence to help build any sense of exhaustion or not? And then also, how did using real footage of Jim McKay reporting kind of ground the film and help shape or guide the story? 

11:26 - Ben Chaplin (Guest)
Well, it's a good question. It's something that you always also wish as a director, but we haven't like it's a good question, it's something that you always also wish as a director, but we haven't like it's. Very often it's the price at which it would come to shoot in sequence is too high. It's logistically very complicated, with talent being available, and I mean, with this talent in front of the camera, they can very much, you know. Yeah, of course, what we tried to do, we didn't start with the most emotional ending scene. Right, that's, of course, things that we tried to avoid. 

12:02
For example, with John Magaro, like in the movie, there's this moment where he for the first time directs a live television right in the show in the film, and we also then make sure that when we shot that scene, it was also the first time that he did that for our own movie, and he actually then knew because he was nervous, because in a way, he wanted to portray these people that he observed accurately. Yeah, and he was nervous about this, but that's this, this helped a lot because it was it for him, also for the character. And then to the second question yeah, I think there should be another oh yeah on this, on this, on this uh poster and another actor's name. Uh, let's check, hey, because we did shoot some parts of the footage we shot, because we did shoot some parts of the footage we reshot. But it was very clear for us very early on Jim McKay, the human element that we can't copy right and to reenact that with an actor, so it would have never gotten the feeling that we get now. 

13:05 - Leonie Benesch (Guest)
Yeah, he's a great anchor for us because, I mean, john, I think all of us acted with him the most, but having him there as a real person, it's just a great anchor because you can't overact. If you've got the truthfulness of Jim McKay over there, if you then try to make something bigger, you will look like an idiot. So that was just a good reminder to work. 

13:29 - Candice Bloch (Host)
think for the tone that yes everything was so yeah well, I know they need to get to the next person, so thank you so so I um wish I could have gotten to a couple more, but you know it is what it is, oh sorry. And compliments of paramount pictures here now is the film's trailer. 

14:09 - VO (Host)
And we're clear. Great job, everyone Did you hear that Were those gunshots. What's the situation? 

14:27 - Leonie Benesch (Guest)
The police are reporting that armed terrorists have attacked the Israeli athletes. 

14:31 - VO (Host)
There's a hostage situation going on right now in the Olympic Village. Abc wants news to take over. Your sports are in way over your head. We're hundred yards away from where this is happening. We are the only people capable of following it live. This is our story and we're keeping it. What do I tell the cameras? What do you mean? I mean, can we show someone being shot on live television? We're on. The piece of what have been called the Serena Olympics was shattered this morning. The games are still going on. Within a few hundred yards, nine terrified living human beings are being held prisoner. You need to understand how sensitive the situation is. 

15:14 - Leonie Benesch (Guest)
These are just local cops doing things they have never done before. 

15:21 - VO (Host)
Make it broadcast history. More people have seen this than watch Armstrong land on the moon. Now police are on the roof. Oh guys, that's a TV. Are they seeing what we're seeing? What are you talking about? Are the terrorists seeing this? Our job is to tell the story of these individuals whose lives are at stake. It's not okay. If we make it worse, it's a mad. If we made it worse, it's a manhunt down here. They know the whole world is watching. If they shoot someone on live television, whose story is that? Is it ours or is it theirs? 

16:14 - Candice Bloch (Host)
September 5 is currently in select theaters and opens nationwide on January 17th. 

16:18 - VO (Host)
Thanks for listening to Media Maker Spotlight from Women in Film and Video. To learn more about WIF, visit. This podcast is created by Sandra Abrams, candice Block, brandon Ferry, tara Jabari and Jerry Reinhart, and edited by Michelle Kim and Inez Perez, with audio production and mix by Steve Lack audio Subscribe. To continue learning from more amazing media makers, please visit medium maker spotlightcom for more information. 


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