The
Men Who Killed Kennedy
Photo:
Arlen Specter , author of the Single Bullet Theory
According to Dave Reitzes in his “Links and Views”: Nigel Turner's The Men Who Killed Kennedy premiered on England's Central Independent Television as a two-part documentary in October 1988. Three additional installments were filmed two years later, with a sixth episode added in 1995. Though the series was not widely seen in the United States at first, the first five installments were shown a number of times on the Arts and Entertainment cable channel (with Hilary Minster's narration replaced by the voice of Chicago broadcaster Bill Kurtis), and all six episodes have recently begun popping up (in somewhat edited form) on another cable station, the History Channel. Whether this is a good thing or not depends largely upon whom you ask.
Photo:
Jack Brazil ."Sewer" theorist
Certainly,
Turner's series is nothing if not controversial, even among conspiracy
theorists, and even among those who served as some of the series' own sources
of information. For example, when President (and former Warren Commission
member) Gerald R. Ford and former Warren Commission legal counsel David W.
Belin blasted The Men Who Killed Kennedy in the Washington Post
in 1991 (in an article primarily about
Oliver Stone's movie, JFK), none other than JFK
assassination research pioneer (and on-screen interviewee for The Men Who
Killed Kennedy) Harold Weisberg chimed in his agreement.
Photo:
Harrison Livingstone -- conspiracy
author.
It took 27 years," Weisberg noted dryly, "but David Belin, writing with Gerald R. Ford, has finally said one thing with which I agree: Nigel Turner's A&E series 'The Men Who Killed Kennedy' and Oliver Stone's current commercialization and exploitation of that great tragedy are both very, very bad."(1) . On the other hand, Gary Mack, one of two senior consultants for the first five episodes (and currently an archivist at Dallas' Sixth Floor Museum), is critical of certain aspects of the series as well as some of producer Nigel Turner's methods, but overall remains pleased with much of the finished product. Mack says: Neither [senior consultant Robert] Groden nor I were aware of the Corsican hit team theory [which was linked to Mack's "Badge Man" theory, and played a large role in Turner's overall conspiracy theory], developed primarily by Steve Rivele. The original 1988 British broadcast named the three hit men and accused them of killing Kennedy. One, [Lucien] Sarti, was dead, but the other two were still alive.
Continues on the following pages