On June 3, 2017, FBI agents arrived at Reality Winner’s doorstep with a search warrant, scouring the Augusta, Georgia, home to look for top secret U.S. documents that Winner had allegedly distributed. And about two hours later, Winner was led away in handcuffs.
The document in question, a top secret NSA piece which Winner leaked to The Intercept, an investigative journalism nonprofit, explained how Russian military intelligence had attempted a “voter registration-themed spear-phishing campaign targeting U.S. local government organizations.” In other words, the document offered insight into Russian attempts to interfere with voting software in the 2016 election.
Winner, charged under the Espionage Act, would receive just over a five-year prison sentence for her actions, which remains as the longest sentence ever imposed for the “unauthorized transmission of national defense information.”
Soon after, playwright Tina Satter turned Winner’s FBI interrogation transcript into the play Is This a Room, in which characters act out the transcript almost entirely verbatim. And in the dramatized documentary Reality, Satter takes that same concept to the screen.
Regardless of the viewer’s opinion of Winner’s actions, Reality provides viewers with additional historical context about the relatively recent events that it dramatizes.
Reality Winner studied many religions, and that’s evident in this docudrama, too. We see the Ayat al-Kursi (a prominent verse of the Quran) hanging on her wall. We also see a Quran filled with sticky notes, a Protestant cross and a book about the sayings of Buddha. An Instagram post mentions how a recipe is kosher for Passover. Reality also practices yoga.
None.
None.
God’s name is used in vain six times. “B–ch” and “p-ss” are both used once.
None.
We hear a couple comments about urination. We hear a frightening story about someone who tried to get into Reality’s home in the middle of the night.
When FBI agents arrive at Reality Winner’s home, they’re not trying to figure out if Reality did leaked classified information; they’re looking for why she did it. And Reality documents the interrogation tactics a couple of FBI agents use in order to illicit the answer to that question.
From the moment Reality begins speaking with the agents, the stress of her situation grows. At first, it’s mere confusion. But as more and more agents show up at her home, and as the agents’ interrogation continues to leave her closer and closer to admitting the truth, the gravity of her situation grows ever more ominous. And in the process, it leaves the viewer feeling almost as pinned and uncomfortable as Reality does.
It’s unclear why Reality garnered a TV-MA rating when the worst of its content issues are a handful of occasions where Reality uses God’s name is vain. We didn’t see anything that would warrant a rating more restrictive than TV-PG.
Reality tells this story brusquely and sticks to known details without overstaying its welcome. In fact, when I pulled up the interrogation transcript to follow along with it, I found that the film cut out some parts that could have made it a longer watch.
And perhaps that’s the biggest takeaway here: Some who watch this docudrama may be motivated, as I was, to dig deeper into news and history that this film puts bluntly before us.
Kennedy Unthank studied journalism at the University of Missouri. He knew he wanted to write for a living when he won a contest for “best fantasy story” while in the 4th grade. What he didn’t know at the time, however, was that he was the only person to submit a story. Regardless, the seed was planted. Kennedy collects and plays board games in his free time, and he loves to talk about biblical apologetics. He thinks the ending of Lost “wasn’t that bad.”
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