Titanic (TV miniseries)

Titanic
Directed by	Robert Lieberman
Produced by	Harold Lee Tichenor Rocky Lang
Written by	Ross LaManna Joyce Eliason
Starring	Peter Gallagher George C. Scott Catherine Zeta-Jones Eva Marie Saint Tim Curry Harley Jane Kozak Marilu Henner
Music by	Lennie Niehaus
Cinematography	David Hennings
Editing by	Tod Feuerman
Distributed by	RHI Entertainment
Release date(s)	November 17, 1996
Running time	173 min.
Country	Canada/United States
Language	English
Budget	$13,000,000 (estimated)

Titanic is a made-for-TV movie that premièred on CBS in 1996. Titanic follows several characters on board the RMS Titanic when she sinks on her maiden voyage in 1912. The miniseries was directed by Robert Lieberman. The original music score was composed by Lennie Niehaus. This is the first Titanic movie to show the ship breaking in two.

Plot

The movie opens on April 9, 1912 in London. Alice Cleaver (Felicity Waterman) wakes from a nightmare about a baby drowning in the ocean. She then attends a job interview with the Allison family, hoping to become a full-time nurse for their young daughter, Loraine (Devon Hoholuk), and their baby son, Trevor. Bess Allison (Harley Jane Kozak) gives Alice the job and informs her that they will be sailing on the Titanic.

The scene then moves to Southampton on the same day, the day before the Titanic is due to sail. Captain Edward John Smith (George C. Scott) is overseeing the final preparations onboard the ship. He is forced to give a reluctant interview to a crowd of newspaper reporters who are being given a tour of the Titanic by J. Bruce Ismay (Roger Rees), the White Star Line's managing director.

At the same time, a young vagrant named Jamie Perse (Mike Doyle) is running through the streets of Southampton with the police after him, having stolen a wallet. He hides in a pub where he meets Simon Doonan (Tim Curry) and Mr Dickie (Don MacKay). Doonan helps him out by lending him his flat cap to use as a disguise. Dickie explains that he has a Third Class ticket for the Titanic and is moving to America to start a new life. Doonan tells Jamie that some of the richest people in the world are sailing on the ship, and it would be a thief's dream. Doonan leaves shortly after and Jamie stays with Dickie, who gets drunk. While Jamie is helping the intoxicated Dickie back to his boarding house, Dickie passes out in the street. Seizing the opportunity, Jamie steals Dickie's money and his Titanic ticket.

The following morning, April 10, all the passengers are arriving to board the ship. Among them is Isabella Paradine (Catherine Zeta-Jones), who is traveling on the Titanic to join her husband after attending her aunt's funeral in England. Just before she boards, she meets Wynn Park (Peter Gallagher), her former lover, and is dismayed to learn that he is also travelling on the Titanic. Meanwhile, Danish girl Aase Ludvigsen (Sonsee Ahray), a recent Christian convert and missionary, checks into Third Class with the Jack family, with whom she is travelling. Jamie Perse arrives at the same time, and is shocked to discover that the steward checking them in is in fact Simon Doonan, who did not reveal what he did for a living when he was with him in the pub the previous night. When Jamie gives Dickie's name, Doonan knows he has stolen the ticket, but does not say anything. In First Class, as the ship departs Southampton, Isabella is reunited with an old family friend, Hazel Foley (Eva Marie Saint), who assures her that she will keep her company on the voyage and comfort her while she is in mourning for her aunt.

On the first night, Alice Cleaver is out with the Allison children when she runs into Miss Miller (Crystal Verge), a maid to Madeleine Astor, wife of legendary millionaire John Jacob Astor. Miller recognises Alice's face, but she can't remember where she knows her from. On the same night, Jamie Perse tries to get into the First Class area, but is turned away by Fifth Officer Lowe (Kavan Smith). He then steals a dinner suit from the laundry and manages to get into the First Class Smoking Room, where he meets Margaret "Molly" Brown (Marilu Henner) and John Jacob Astor (Scott Hylands). After managing to discreetly steal Astor's billfold, Jamie makes his way back to Third Class but runs into Simon Doonan on the way. Doonan tells Jamie that he saw him steal Astor's billfold and asks him to give it to him, but says he will not report him. Doonan suggests that the best time to steal bilfolds is on the last night, not the first, revealing that he too is a thief.

Over the next days, Jamie is shown by Doonan how easy it is to gain entry to the First Class staterooms, and the two start to plan a massive robbery they will carry out the night before the Titanic is due to dock in New York. Jamie also spends a lot of time with Aase Ludvigsen, and they gradually begin to fall in love. In First Class, Isabella Paradine has also started to fall in love with Wynn Park once again, then they quickly restart their affair. Wynn asks Isabella to leave her husband and move to Bolivia with him. Unsure of what to do, Isabella asks the advice of John Jacob Astor's new young wife, Madeleine (Jane Mortil), who has experience with the divorce process as she is Astor's second wife. Isabella explains that she could never leave her daughter, and her husband does not deserve the heartache it would cause either.

On the evening of April 14, Isabella makes her decision and sends a wireless telegram to her husband, telling him about Wynn and that she is moving to Bolivia with him. In Third Class, Aase is raped by Simon Doonan while she is taking a shower, revealing that he is a much more violent and callous criminal than Jamie. At the same time, Miss Miller suddenly remembers where she had seen Alice Cleaver before. She tells Astor that she saw Alice in the paper, when she was convicted for murdering her baby by throwing him from a train. Shortly after, the Titanic strikes the iceberg, and an emergency evacuation is ordered by Captain Smith.

Jamie discovers Aase has been attacked, but she refuses to tell him what happened. Doonan then appears and tells Jamie that the sinking has given them the perfect opportunity to rob the staterooms, which have been abandoned in a panic. Jamie goes with Doonan, but promises Aase and Clarinda Jack (Tamsin Kelsey) that he will come back for them. As the ship sinks, the passengers are evacuated into the lifeboats, with women and children having first priority.

Wireless operators Harold Bride (Barry Pepper) and Jack Phillips (Matt Hill) manage to make contact with the RMS Carpathia, and inform them they only have an hour before the ship sinks. The ship's Captain, Arthur Rostron (Terence Kelly), immediately turns the Carpathia around and heads toward the Titanic, but gravely realises that it will take over 4 hours to reach them.

In First Class, the Allison family are in a panic about what to do. Alice is trying to persuade Bess to abandon their cabin and get to a lifeboat, but she refuses. In desperation, Alice takes baby Trevor from his cot and runs to the Boat Deck, where she manages to get onboard a lifeboat. The Allisons refuse to leave the ship without Trevor, and start searching the ship for him, unaware that he and Alice have already left.

While robbing the staterooms, Jamie is growing agitated and wants to return to Aase. Doonan then inadvertently reveals that it was he who raped her. Jamie attacks him, but Doonan overpowers him. Jamie abandons Doonan and returns to Third Class to help Aase and the Jack family to the lifeboats. Aase has lost her faith following her rape, but Jamie is able to persuade her to leave and manages to get her into a lifeboat, promising to find her if he survives. Shortly after, Doonan boards Aase's boat disguised as a woman, and he panics when he sees that Aase is also in the boat. Isabella is refusing to leave Wynn, but he forces her into Aase's lifeboat. As the boat is lowered, Isabella confesses a long kept secret to Wynn - that her daughter is actually his child. On the other side of the ship, Molly Brown is also forced into a boat against her will by the officers, wanting to stay and help the other women board first. Jamie helps out the officers by lowering one of the other boats down to the ocean, but in doing so he slips and falls from the deck into the boat below, breaking his arm, before passing out.

Hudson Allison (Kevin Conway) and Bess are still looking for Trevor, but realise they must get their young daughter Loraine onto a lifeboat. They find Captain Smith, who tells them that all the boats have gone. At the same time the Jack family finally reach the Boat Deck, only to also discover that there are no boats. Shortly afterwards, the Titanic breaks into two pieces before disappearing beneath the sea.

Following the sinking, Isabella persuades Officer Lowe to return to pick up survivors from the site. After much hesitation, Lowe agrees. As they are about to turn around, Doonan reveals himself from his disguise, stating that it would a huge mistake to return as survivors would swamp the boat. Aase, recognising Doonan, attacks him but he throws her overboard. He then produces a gun and orders Lowe to continue away from the site of the sinking, but Lowe hits Doonan on the head with an oar, snapping his neck. In another boat, Molly Brown spots a rocket being fired from a ship on the horizon. She organises the women in her lifeboat, two to an oar, and taking an oar herself, they start to row towards the ship. Isabella and Lowe do the same in their boat, and everyone starts shouting and waving in the direction of the ship.

As the sun comes up, the Carpathia has reached the lifeboats. On deck, Isabella waits anxiously with Madeleine Astor as bodies are recovered from the sea. Isabella is grief stricken when she finds Wynn's lifeless body on deck amongst other victims who have died of hypothermia. Jamie is relieved when he finds Aase, who is being tended to by Molly Brown. Molly explains that Aase survived after she was pulled from the water by Isabella and Officer Lowe. After searching the waters for several hours, Rostron decides they won't find any more survivors, and the Carpathia departs.

When the Carpathia reaches New York, the survivors disembark to meet their relatives. Molly Brown sells her story to the press, stating that is planning to run for the Senate. Isabella and Madeleine disembark together. Isabella realises she is now on her own due to her admitting her affair in the wireless telegram she sent to her husband. Alice Cleaver is met by the authorities, after being reported by Miss Miller for taking baby Trevor without permission. Hudson Allison's brother takes custody of Trevor, his parents and sister having perished in the disaster. John Jacob Astor's sons arrive to collect Madeleine, who says a fond goodbye to Isabella. Jamie and Aase depart the dock together, planning to start a new life in California.

As Isabella leaves the dock, she is both shocked and delighted to see her husband, Eddie (Dale Wilson) and her daughter, Claire (Shaina Tianne Unger) waiting for her. It is revealed that Eddie did not receive the wireless message as the telegram was never sent out due to the sinking. Arm-in-arm, the Paradines leave the dock together.

Cast

Actor	Role
Peter Gallagher	Wynn Park
George C. Scott	Captain E. J. Smith
Catherine Zeta-Jones	Isabella Paradine
Eva Marie Saint	Hazel Foley
Tim Curry	Simon Doonan
Roger Rees	J. Bruce Ismay
Harley Jane Kozak	Bess Allison
Marilu Henner	Margaret "Molly" Brown
Mike Doyle	Jamie Perse
Sonsee Ahray	Aase Ludvigsen
Felicity Waterman	Alice Cleaver
Malcolm Stewart	First Officer William Murdoch
Kevin McNulty	Second Officer Charles Lightoller
Kavan Smith	Fifth Officer Harold Lowe
Terence Kelly	Captain Arthur Rostron
Scott Hylands	John Jacob Astor IV
Jane Mortil	Madeleine Astor
Tamsin Kelsey	Clarinda Jack
Eric Keenleyside	"Black" Billy Jack
Katharine Isabelle	Ophelia Jack (as Katherine Isobel)
Kevin Conway	Hudson J. Allison
Barry Pepper	Assistant Marconi Operator Harold Bride

Historical inaccuracies

Produced in advance of the imminent James Cameron film on the same topic, this TV version was rushed into production and very hastily completed in order to cash in on the latter's pre-release hype. It premiered over two nights in late November 1996. The first part received high Nielsen ratings, but experienced a huge drop during the second part, because most viewers got turned off by the lackluster production.^{[citation needed]} Since the film was so rushed, it included mistakes and historical inaccuracies which Titanic enthusiasts found inexcusable given the wealth of knowledge about the liner and its occupants available by the mid-1990s.

• There are several errors relating to Margaret Brown. She actually boarded the Titanic at Cherbourg, not Southampton. She was not known as "Molly" until after her death, and in contrast to her portrayal as a raving, oversexed hillbilly, she was in fact an intelligent, well-mannered, social and political activist. She was also much older and less attractive than actress Marilu Henner. Furthermore, she is seen drinking and gambling in the smoking room; in realty, the smoking room was a male-only domain on ocean-liners until the late 1920s and therefore women, such as Brown, would have been forbidden to be there.
• Margaret Brown and several other passengers did not go to dinner after boarding the ship as seen in the film. They boarded the ship while dinner was being served, and did not have time to eat.
• The first-class smoking room did not have a bar. The stewards served drinks and other beverages in a classic waiting fashion.
• Captain Smith is seen using a rolled-out blueprint to explain the nature of the ship's damage, and how long she will remain afloat, to Bruce Ismay and the senior officers. According to eyewitness testimony from survivors, it was Titanic designer Thomas Andrews who did this. Indeed, Andrews, who played a key role in the events of that fateful night, is omitted from the movie.
• Captain Smith is shown chastising First Officer Murdoch for not hitting the iceberg head-on, a collision that would have probably caused less damage to the Titanic, allowing her to remain afloat. However, Murdoch, as most navigators are trained to do, tried to avoid the collision all together by attempting to turn the Titanic away from danger. Smith, an experienced seaman, would have understood Murdoch's actions.
• Smith also is shown at the helm, and allowing a passenger (Mrs. Paradine) to "steer" the ship. In reality, a seaman would be at the helm, and passengers would not be allowed on the bridge, much less be able to steer the ship.
• When the excess steam is being let off, it is shown emerging from the funnels instead of the safety valves, as would have been the case.
• Captain Smith is seen complaining that the distress rockets should be red, not white. In fact, white is the correct color and Smith would have known this.
• There was no gate between the steerage to first class on A deck, and the entrance out of steerage around that area led to B deck.
• When instructing the wireless operators to send a distress call to other ships, Smith erroneously describes the CQD call as "Come Quickly, Distress". Neither CQD nor SOS stand for anything.
• The Southampton crowd is shown waving off the Titanic off the starboard side. In real life, they did so on the port side.
• A caption at the end of the film claims that "All attempts to raise [the Titanic] have failed". No attempts to raise the entire ship have ever been made, but two attempts have been made to raise a piece of the ship's hull. The first attempt in 1996 ended in failure, but the second attempt in 1998 was successful.
• There are several errors relating to the Allisons and Alice Cleaver. The Allisons' nurse was not the child murderer Alice Mary Cleaver. She was Alice Catherine Cleaver, a different woman. There are problems with them throughout the whole film. In additions to Alice Cleaver, the Allisons had their maid Sarah Daniels traveling with them, who was whisked into a lifeboat when she went on deck to investigate the commotion after the collision. Additionally, Alice Cleaver did not sleep with the Allison children, or only slept with Trevor in their stateroom. The film shows her in the same cabin as Loraine. Cleaver and Trevor Allison boarded lifeboat number 11, quite late into the sinking, not lifeboat 7, the first one launched. The Allisons were also Canadians, not Americans as portrayed in the film.
• There was no organized dancing on the Titanic as depicted in the film. The tango (which some characters perform) originated in the bordellos of Argentina and would have been beneath the notice of the upper classes of 1912, who would have considered dancing during dinner to be inappropriate.
• When Wynn and Isabella make love, moonlight is coming in through a window, instead of a porthole, as would have been the case.
• The Titanic was not booked solid as stated in the film. The first and second class cabins were less than half full.
• John Jacob Astor IV actually had one son and one daughter from his first marriage, not two sons as stated in the film. Astor is also shown to quip: "I asked for ice, but this is ridiculous." This is an urban legend.
• A steerage bathroom is seen during the rape scene, but in reality Titanic's third class had only two bathtubs for use by all passengers. There were no shower stalls as seen in the film.
• J. Bruce Ismay did not participate in the final outfitting of the ship and was not in the boiler room (a location forbidden to passengers) at any time during the voyage. As in most films on the subject, Ismay's role is greatly exaggerated. He did not force the ship's crew to run the liner at breakneck speed. It was in fact a regular practice for ships to cross the Atlantic at high speed. He testified at the Senate hearings on the sinking that had the ship been traveling at its maximum speed, it would have arrived in New York in the middle of the night and would have had to wait up to eight hours for a pilot and customs clearance.
• Fourth Officer Joseph Boxhall in fact survived the sinking. Chief Officer Henry Wilde, Third Officer Herbert Pitman and Sixth Officer James Moody are all omitted from the movie.
• While there are various reports of an officer committing suicide late in the sinking, it is not known whether First Officer William Murdoch was the officer in question, if indeed it happened at all.
• Murdoch uses a pair of binoculars to get a better view of the iceberg just after it has been sighted. In reality, due to a mix-up at Southampton, no Titanic officers had binoculars. He is also seen with a Nelson or Executive loop on his sleeves, which is reserved for the captain of a vessel.
• There were no press conferences held aboard the ship on the day before her maiden voyage. The speech Captain Smith gives the reporters was delivered by him five years earlier on another White Star liner, the Adriatic.
• By 1912, "moving pictures" were well established, so it is unlikely that some characters would be shocked at the concept. Furthermore, it is implausible that Jamie Perse would know of Mary Pickford, who did not become a major movie star until 1917.
• Several passengers visit a service window to receive and send out wireless telegrams. Such a window did not exist on the Titanic; first-class passengers sent and received telegrams via stewards, who delivered them to the Marconi operators.
• The Carpathia's deck was not littered with corpses. The majority of the bodies were recovered by the CS Mackay-Bennett, which was chartered by the White Star Line for this purpose.
• Californian captain Stanley Lord and its wireless operator Cyril Evans were much younger than the actors who portrayed them. Captain Lord was in his mid-thirties, while Evans was twenty.
• During a sweeping crane shot of the port side of the ship, several mistakes in the design of the set are apparent, including an extra deck house on the poop and forecastle decks, the main mast facing the wrong direction, and the absence of 'B' Deck.
• The first-class dining room was actually located on D Deck, not on A Deck right below the Grand Staircase as depicted in the film. The actual first-class dining room was painted white, not peaches-and-cream as shown in the film. Access to the dining saloon was gained through two sets of double doors leading from the reception room located at the bottom of the Grand Staircase. In the film, three large arched openings are shown.
• Even though the Titanic had a Ritz-inspired restaurant, it did not have a two-story tea room with revolving doors and huge windows as depicted in the film. There was not enough room on the ship for such a structure.
• The glass dome over the Grand Staircase is omitted, instead replaced by a regular ceiling and chandelier.
• The Morse code lamp was located on top of the bridge, but in the film its location is shifted onto the front of the first class promenade deck.
• Sunrise on April 14 at a latitude near 40 degrees north would be before 5:30 am local solar time. It is shown as occurring at 7:00 am, impossible by any reasonable clock setting. Daylight Saving Time was not in use in 1912.
• The ship did not have a brig, or any kind of prison, as mentioned by Jamie Perse. Furthermore, brig is a naval term and would not be used on a civilian vessel.
• The Titanic was built and fitted out in Belfast, not Southampton as shown in the film.
• Shortly after the ship collides with the iceberg, first-class passengers Molly Brown, John Jacob Astor and the fictional character of "Mr. Foley" (loosely based on Sir Cosmo Edmund Duff-Gordon, a real passenger) are shown emerging from the second class entrance at the aft port side of the boat deck. To top off this odd moment, the trio is then shown admiring the passengers tossing around the pieces of ice that fell onto the deck after the collision, even though the ship hit the berg with her starboard side at the bow and the iceberg never even fully reached A-deck, which was a level below the boat deck.
• After the rescue aboard the Carpathia, the lifeboats change from period wooden vessels to modern metallic ones, and once the survivors step out of them, they are seen gathered next to various modern deck machinery, revealing they are on a modern ship.
• The distress rockets are shown burning as simple white balls. As depicted later in Titanic (1997), they actually burst into stars.
• Although it has been pointed out that the First Class dining room was actually located on D Deck, not on A Deck right below the Grand Staircase as depicted in the film, it is later shown that Jamie Perse and Simon Doonan are looking at it through the boat deck windows.
• When Alice says "We're all going to die!" it is 11:45 p.m. and there is light coming through the windows.
• Molly Brown makes a remark to Captain Smith about his retirement in three days, and he accepts this, but Smith was to have retired only after the return trip to England.
• The Titanic's lookouts did indeed have to work without binoculars, but not because they had been taken to the bridge for use there, but because none were loaded due to a mix-up at Southampton.
• Smith says to Ismay that the ship has precisely the number of lifeboats required by the British Board of Trade regulations. In fact it had four collapsible lifeboats in addition to the 16 boats that were required.
• After arriving in New York, there is a scene on the balcony / walkway where the corner of the American flag shows. The flag has a field of stars staggered like in today's 50-star flag. The flag in 1912 would have been stars in a field of blue in straight rows.
• Mrs. Miller refers to John Jacob Astor as the richest man in the world, which was not the case.
• The term "see-through" was not used for fabrics until about 1950.

Reception

Titanic received mixed reviews from critics. The New York Daily News commented on the fact that the acting was substandard and the ship's operators and owner are portrayed "about as sympathetically as those connected with the Exxon Valdez." The Seattle Post-Intelligencer also referenced the "embarrassingly bad acting" and out of place scenes.

The film however bears some resemblances to the 1997 theatrical film of the same name in that the female leads, played by Catherine Zeta-Jones and Kate Winslet, respectively, are at odds with the privileged lifestyles they're living. Also, a historical personality, First Officer William McMaster Murdoch commits suicide in both films, an event which cannot be proven.

Awards

Titanic received an Emmy Award for Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Drama Miniseries or a Special. It was also nominated for Outstanding Costume Design for a Miniseries or a Special.

Year	Category	Nominee(s)	Result
1997	Outstanding Sound Mixing for a Drama Miniseries or a Special	David Husby, David E. Fluhr, Adam Jenkins, Don Digirolamo	Won
	Outstanding Costume Design for a Miniseries or a Special	Joe I. Tompkins, Jori Woodman	Nominated

External links

• Titanic (TV miniseries) at the Internet Movie Database
• Titanic (TV miniseries) at AllRovi