If you have an anecdote from one source, you file it away. If you hear it again, it may be true. Then the more times you hear it the less likely it is to be true.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I know that from the days of Watergate... the notion of two sources on a story has become the popular dogma about how you confirm something. And there is a lot of truth to that, but there are all kinds of ways to check to the extent that you can, a story that you get.
Every fact in my films is true. And yet how often do I have to read over and over again about supposed falsehoods?
My work is about giving voice to the unheard, and reiterating the voice of the heard in such a way that you question, or re-examine, what is the truth.
I will never repeat something verbatim on the air unless I know it's accurate. And when you go to the source, sometimes there's a better story beyond the original story. That happens all the time.
People think that if they read something in the newspaper or see it on TV, it has to be true.
Anybody can make something up and have it sound believable. The hard part is remembering all the lies you've told, and all the people you've told them to, and then living the lies that have become your life.
Sometimes, in a fictional story, you can be more honest and truthful, actually. As a journalist, you're a prisoner of the data, in effect. You have to tell the story with evidence you can verify.
Journalists say a thing that they know isn't true, in the hope that if they keep on saying it long enough it will be true.
What you hear repeatedly you will eventually believe.
I have a rule in research: The third time you hear something, it's generally true.