Late night telephone call Nixon to Frost

That call did not actually happen. It was a dramatic device to bring in some of the background information on Nixon's insecurity about his working-class background (in contrast to Frost's more gentrified childhood and Cambridge University days).

But, while that particular conversation never happened, it was well-known among Nixon's circle that he was given to middle-of-the-night phone calls to associates, where he would ramble at length. Sometimes he may have been drinking, but not as a rule. He was not a regular drinker. Sometimes the following day he had no recollection of the phone call (s), which is not an uncommon thing to happen when someone wakes up in the middle of the night and has a conversation, however lucid at the time. Nixon's aides were warned never to act on anything they were told during these nocturnal conversations, unless it was confirmed again in daylight hours.

Some of these conversations have survived. Here are a couple:

http://www.mediaite.com/online/listen-was-richard-nixon-wasted-in-1973-phone-call-with-ronald-reagan/

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2383176/Richard-Nixons-drunk-phone-trusted-White-House-Chief-Staff-forced-resign-Watergate-scandal.html

In the DVD extra features, Ron Howard does a very good job of explaining why they included that historical inaccuracy.

They felt that the phone call did a pretty good job of representing certain aspects of the relationship between the 2 men, even though the call itself never actually happened. When Howard explained all the things that they knew about the relationship between Frost and Nixon, I felt that the phone call was justifiable as a short hand narrative device.

It was historically inaccurate, but it did not misrepresent the relationship the 2 men had. This was my impression.

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