I’d written “vodka,” and David, our director, wanted beer.
“Beck’s,” to be specific.
We knew that Mark Zuckerberg was drinking and drunk at 9 p.m. on a Tuesday in October in 2003.
Rich Fury/Getty Images; GLEN WILSON/Amazon Studios
These student directories were called facebooks.
We knew all this because Zuckerberg told us.
He was live-blogging the whole night.
We started tight on a computer screen.
Then, two weeks before the start of production, we found out Mark was drinking beer that night.
So David told me we’d need to change it to Beck’s.
In other words, by being accurate, we might be obscuring the truth.
And that’s the tug-of-war a screenwriter goes through when they’re writing nonfiction.
A photograph or a painting.
I lost the argument with David.
Which brings us toBeing the Ricardos.
For the purposes of the story I was telling, it only mattered that those things happened.
I wouldn’t be defaming anyone and, as for perverting history, again, not really.
They prioritize truth over accuracy.
