60 Minutes (1968)
TV Show
First aired
Jeffrey Wigand interview, February 4, 1996
Mike Wallace's two-part report with the former Brown & Williamson research executive was the first time a major tobacco insider said on camera that the industry knew its products were addictive and contained additives that raised health risks.
The story behind it is as instructive as the interview. CBS lawyers, worried about a lawsuit over Wigand's confidentiality agreement, kept the full piece off the air in 1995, and it ran only after his testimony was published elsewhere. Watch it for how a long, calm interview can carry more weight than any hidden camera, and pair it with the film The Insider if the newsroom drama interests you.
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