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Citizen Cohn is a 1992 cable film covering the life of Joseph McCarthy's controversial chief counsel Roy Cohn. James Woods, who starred as Cohn, was nominated for both an Emmy and a Golden Globe for his performance. Citizen Cohn also stars Joe Don Baker (as McCarthy), Ed Flanders (as Cohn's courtroom nemesis Joseph Welch), Frederic Forrest (as writer Dashiell Hammett), and Pat Hingle (as Cohn's onetime mentor J. Edgar Hoover). It was directed by Frank Pierson. The movie was filmed on location in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Citizen Cohn
Genre	Drama
Based on	Citizen Cohn by Nicholas von Hoffman
Written by	David Franzoni
Directed by	Frank Pierson
Starring	James Woods
Music by	Thomas Newman
Country of origin	United States
Original language	English
Production
Executive producers	Linda Gottlieb Mark Rosenberg Paula Weinstein
Producers	Doro Bachrach Cynthia Fitzpatrick Alan Haft (associate producer) Daniel Schneider [1] (associate producer)
Production locations	Carnegie Mellon University Pittsburgh
Cinematography	Paul Elliott
Editor	Peter Zinner
Running time	111 minutes
Production companies	Breakheart Films Spring Creek Productions HBO Pictures
Distributor	HBO
Release
Original network	HBO
Picture format	Color
Audio format	Stereo
Original release	August 22, 1992 (1992-08-22)

Synopsis

The film spans Cohn's life from childhood through his initial rise to power as McCarthy's right-hand man in the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations hearings and his eventual public discrediting a month before his death in 1986 from AIDS. It is told mostly in flashback as Cohn lies dying at a hospital in Bethesda, Maryland, hallucinating that his many enemies (from Robert F. Kennedy to Ethel Rosenberg, a convicted Communist spy he sent to the electric chair) are haunting him. It concerns aspects of Cohn's life such as his closeted homosexuality and the measure of his culpability in the "Red Scare" of the 1950s. While the movie portrays Cohn in a decidedly unsympathetic light, it also depicts episodes in his life, such as the death of his beloved mother, in which he showed a more humane, compassionate side.

Cast

• James Woods as Roy Marcus Cohn
• Joe Don Baker as Sen. Joseph McCarthy
• Joseph Bologna as Walter Winchell
• Ed Flanders as Joseph N. Welch
• Jeffrey Nordling as G. David Schine
• Frederic Forrest as Dashiell Hammett
• Lee Grant as Dora Cohn
• Pat Hingle as J. Edgar Hoover
• John McMartin as 'Older Doctor'
• Karen Ludwig as Ethel Rosenberg
• Josef Sommer as Albert C. Cohn
• Daniel Benzali as Francis Joseph Cardinal Spellman
• Tovah Feldshuh as Iva Schlesinger
• John Finn as Sen. Charles Potter
• Fritz Weaver as Sen. Everett Dirksen
• Frances Foster as 'First Annie Lee Moss'
• Novella Nelson as 'Second Annie Lee Moss'
• Allen Garfield as Abe Feller
• David Marshall Grant as Robert F. Kennedy
• Daniel von Bargen as Clyde Tolson
• Lester Hoffman as Executioner #1

Score

Thomas Newman composed the largely minimalist film score.

See also

• Angels in America

References

External links

• Citizen Cohn at IMDb
• McCarthyism and the Movies
• Welch-Cohn Confrontation, NY Times

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