The Back Bay Mainline is a struggling alternative newspaper in
“Remember when we used to do everything ourselves?” reminisces one character, poring over snapshots of demonstrations and the first days of the Mainline.
“Yeah. We were dangerous then,” replies another wistfully.
As the Mainline’s readership and finances have waxed, the staff’s early enthusiasm and idealism has waned. The larger story is of the takeover of the paper by a publications conglomerate. That commercialization is writ small in the characters’ ditching of their common cause for individual careers and relationships. Michael (Stephen Collins, who played Hugh Sloan in All the President’s Men) is consumed by his ambition to profit from his years in the counterculture by selling a book on the subject. He is enchanted with his own struggle. When fellow writer Harry asks for tips on how to get an agent, Michael looks incredulous. “Do you know how hard I had to work? How many secretaries hung up on me?” There is something grim about his calculated climb.
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