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CNN Today

LAPD's Changing Image Reflected in Movies and Television

Aired March 14, 2000 - 1:29 p.m. ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

LOU WATERS, CNN ANCHOR: A civilian commission is holding hearings today on the Los Angeles police scandal. The scandal has caused 20 officers to be relieved of duty and 40 criminal convictions to be overturned. It's the latest stain on the reputation of a police department that has seen its public image wax and wane over the years. Since the department operates in the entertainment capital of the world, it should come as no surprise that its changing image has been reflected in movies and on television.

CNN's Anne McDermott reflects on that.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ANNE MCDERMOTT, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The LAPD patrols an area of more than 460 square miles, an area that includes Hollywood, and Hollywood has always taken notice. In the beginning, there was cop as clown, courtesy Mack Sennett. But by the 1950s, Jack Webb created police professionals.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "DRAGNET")

JACK WEBB, ACTOR: This is Friday. Yes, sir.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MCDERMOTT: These were cool cops, dispassionate and polite, the men of "Dragnet," the men of "Adam-12."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP. "ADAM-12")

UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS: 1-Adam-12, 1-Adam-12...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MCDERMOTT: But that image didn't last either, thanks to an LAPD officer by the name of Joseph Wambaugh, who wrote books like "The Choirboys" about cops that weren't. And Hollywood had yet another view of the LAPD.

But it was just a movie, just a book. And yet, a few years later, during the trial of O.J. Simpson:

JOSEPH WAMBAUGH, AUTHOR: Mark Fuhrman said that he was influenced strongly by "The Choirboys," and that when he made his dreadful statements to the screenwriter that blew the O.J. case out of the water, that he was trying to be a Joe Wambaugh doing "The Choirboys."

MCDERMOTT: Anyway, it wasn't long before movies featuring the LAPD grew even darker, like "L.A.Confidential," like "Mulholland Falls."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "MULHOLLAND FALLS")

UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: You guys can't do this. This is America.

NICK NOLTE, ACTOR This isn't America, Jack, this is L.A.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MCDERMOTT: And this is L.A. today.

CHIEF BERNARD PARKS, LOS ANGELES POLICE: It clearly is evident that the image of this department is tarnished.

MCDERMOTT: The current LAPD scandal has so far avoided the Hollywood treatment. It may be that'll change once all the details emerge. Or maybe not. After all, no one has yet to make mass entertainment out of Rodney King.

Anne McDermott, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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