Patton Oswalt is Chuck Colson in a new image from Gaslit, Starz’ limited series about the Watergate scandal. The show stars Julia Roberts, Dan Stevens, Betty Gilpin and Oswalt in the story of the defenders, zealots, insiders and whistleblowers inside the Nixon administration who oversaw the fall of a political regime, and is based on Leon Neyfakh’s excellent Slow Burn podcast.
Chuck Colson ███████ ██ ██. Don't miss @pattonoswalt in #GaslitSTARZ, premiering April 24. pic.twitter.com/DzpZLg6rcM
— Gaslit (@GaslitSTARZ) March 31, 2022
Christians of a certain age will probably be familiar with Colson’s job in all this. He served in an official capacity as Special Counsel to President Richard Nixon and in a less sterling role as Nixon’s hatchet man. Nicknamed “Nixon’s Bulldog” (or, as Slate magazine writer David Plotz called him, “an evil genius”), Colson was more ruthless and determined than anyone to cover-up the Watergate burglaries, sparking an infamous rumor that he “would walk over his own grandmother if necessary” to take down Nixon’s political enemies.
He eventually pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice and went to jail, where he read C.S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity and converted, developing an understandable interest reform and, upon his release, becoming a major figure in Christian ministry and Moral Majority advocacy.
Gaslit will focus on mostly on Martha Mitchell (Roberts), the wife of Nixon’s Attorney General John Mitchell who knew a good deal about her husband’s criminal actions and refused to stop talking about it — to the point that Nixon’s thugs had her on lockdown. It will premiere on Starz next month.
