''Concealed Enemies'' is a 1984 American PBS

docudrama Docudrama (or documentary drama) is a genre of television and film, which features dramatized re-enactments of actual events. It is described as a hybrid of documentary and drama and "a fact-based representation of real event". Docudramas typic ...

, produced by WGBH-TV in Boston, about the events leading to the arrest, conviction and imprisonment of former

U.S. State Department The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs of other nati ...

official

Alger Hiss Alger Hiss (November 11, 1904 – November 15, 1996) was an American government official accused in 1948 of having spied for the Soviet Union in the 1930s. Statutes of limitations had expired for espionage, but he was convicted of perjury in con ...

. Directed by Jeff Bleckner, written by Hugh Whitemore and starring Edward Herrmann as Hiss, John Harkins as Whittaker Chambers and Peter Riegert as Richard Nixon, the two-part miniseries won the 1984 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Limited Series. The title comes from August 25, 1948, known as "Confrontation Day," during which Whittaker Chambers stated:

The story has spread that in testifying against Mr. Hiss I am working out some old grudge, or motives of revenge or hatred. I do not hate Mr. Hiss. We were close friends, but we are caught in a tragedy of history. Mr. Hiss represents the concealed enemy against which we are all fighting, and I am fighting. I have testified against him with remorse and pity, but in a moment of history in which this Nation now stands, so help me God, I could not do otherwise.

Senator

Joseph McCarthy Joseph Raymond McCarthy (November 14, 1908 – May 2, 1957) was an American politician who served as a Republican U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 until his death in 1957. Beginning in 1950, McCarthy became the most visi ...

paraphrased this phrase with his own: "the enemy within." Goldcrest Films invested £558,000 in the film and received £545,000 causing them a loss of £13,000.

References

External links

* 1984 films 1980s American television miniseries Films with screenplays by Hugh Whitemore Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Miniseries winners 1984 drama films American television films American Playhouse Films about Richard Nixon 1980s American films {{US-tv-drama-film-stub