Dirty Secrets, Dirty War

"Dirty Secrets, Dirty War," written by David Cox, recounts his family's experiences in Buenos Aires when his father, Robert Cox, was editor of the Buenos Aires Herald. Evening Post Books/Provided

Argentine Armando Bó, who is most known for co-writing the Academy Award- and Golden Globe Award-winning “Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)," has announced his next feature film. And it's directly connected with Charleston, at least by way of Buenos Aires.

The coming project dramatizes the story of longtime Charleston resident Robert Cox, who along with wife Maud and their family spent years in the perilous crosshairs of Argentina’s so-called “Dirty War.”

As former Buenos Aires Herald editor, Cox courageously and doggedly covered the daily atrocities occurring during Argentina’s 1976-83 military dictatorship at a time when all other papers did not for fear of the most lethal reprisals.

Asado at Cox home

On March 12, 2021, the Cox family met Michael Steinberger, who wrote the script for a film that has been acquired by About Entertainment, the company recently founded by Academy Award-winning Armando Bo. Pictured here: Top row, Pierre Manigault (from left), Peter Cox, Michael Steinberger, David Cox. Bottom row, Maud Cox (from left) and Robert Cox. Maura Hogan/Staff

In story after story, the paper reported on the desaparecido, or the estimated 30,000 Argentine citizens who disappeared at the hands of the military and terrorists, marched from their homes at gunpoint into unmarked cars, often never to be seen again.

Cox and the English-language Herald saved numerous lives by persistently printing their names and circumstances, placing level pressure on the government that regularly resulted in their release.

At a news conference in Buenos Aires this week, Robert and Maud Cox joined Bo to announce the project.

In La Nacion, Bo is quoted as saying, “It is a great opportunity to tell the newer generations, not only in Argentina, the story of this newspaper and of a great editor who in the darkest time was one of the few who dared to tell the truth and open that enormous box of secrets.”

Bo also said he hopes to begin shooting the film in the middle of 2022.

The line to Charleston is direct. When Cox was editor of the paper, it was owned by the parent of what is now The Post and Courier, purchased by Peter Manigault in 1968. In response to threats of assassination in 1979, Robert and Maud Cox and their five children were exiled from Argentina, to ultimately land in Charleston, where Cox took a job as assistant editor of The News and Courier.

Bo will serve as director and producer of the film, a project of his new production house, About Entertainment, which is based in Buenos Aires. It has acquired the rights to “Dirty War,” a script written by Michael Steinberger, a writer for The New York Times Magazine.

Golden Globes (copy)

Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu accepts the award for best screenplay for "Birdman" with Alexander Dinelaris (background from left), Armando Bo, and Nicolas Giacobone at the 72nd annual Golden Globe Awards on Jan. 11, 2015, at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills, Calif. File/Paul Drinkwater/NBC via AP

Steinberger’s script was based on the book “Dirty Secrets, Dirty War: The Exile of Robert J. Cox,” which was written by David Cox, the Coxes' son, and published in 2008 by Evening Post Publishing Co., which is owned by the same company as The Post and Courier.

David Cox was a reporter at the Buenos Aires Herald in the 1990s, covering human rights and other stories, which involved talking to some of the people who committed the atrocities. After being encouraged to write the book by Pierre Manigault, chairman of the board of directors of The Post and Courier's parent, Cox did so as a chronicle for his family to remember his parents’ heroism, after his father could not bring himself to sit down and write it.

“Both my father and my mother are very special people and they just decided to be courageous and help as many people (as they could),” he said.

Cox recalled how as children he and his siblings had seen things that would not come out in the open for as long as 20 or 30 years later. They would often hear of somebody disappearing, with their mothers arriving at the Cox home seeking help in the search for their children.

Drawing from correspondence between Robert Cox and close confidantes, the book trades in the fact-based truth, one that was fiercely suppressed at the time and that David Cox said continues to be difficult for many in the country to process.

“I felt that in some ways there was a debt that I should try to keep telling the story as best I could from everything I heard,” he said. “People didn’t want to talk about it. Even then, everybody wanted to be silent about it.”

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Robert Cox, pictured in 2016 in Buenos Aires, is the subject of a new film announced by director Armando Bo, who plans to begin filming in 2022. Provided 

Steinberger first reached out to Robert Cox in 2016 about writing the script. David Cox was on board for use of his book, compelled by his fellow journalist's perspective on the story, and its cautionary tale: If horrific acts could happen with such frequency and public tolerance in a prosperous, sophisticated city like Buenos Aires, they can happen anywhere.

"Some stories matter more than others," Steinberger said, adding he and David Cox have become good friends over the course of his work on the script, which is his first. It got into Bo's hands after Steinberger cold-pitched it via email to an agent with a focus on international films who quickly responded that she thought she knew someone.

That someone was Bo, who is not only esteemed in his own right, but from Argentine film royalty, with a paternal grandfather of the same name being a legendary film director.

According to David Cox, Bo is the ideal person to share their story, explaining that Bo and Steinberger possess the right sensibility to depict what happened in Argentina. Then, his father was intent on revealing what was happening in a country viewed by the world as civilized and cosmopolitan, and where the most decent people turned out to be torturers.

“Because it can happen anywhere else, no matter what country, no matter what democracy,” he said.

“Really what it comes down to is telling the truth,” he said. “There's only one truth. People try to say there are many different truths, but facts are facts.”

Last March, the Cox family hosted and toasted Steinberger and others at their West Ashley home for a poolside asado, with David Cox grilling up South American barbecue to celebrate the project. The event marked his first in-person meeting with the screenwriter after five years of communications.

Bo teleconferenced into the home with his team, and spoke about the significance of the project for him.

“This is a great opportunity for me to change the subject, to do something that is a lot more real and powerful,” he said, adding he feels as an artist he is mature enough and ready. “I feel like it’s the right moment.”

He also emphasized his deep intent to honor both the family and their story. “Your experience is so strong that, in a way, our biggest pressure is to be in the best place,” he said, with mention of achieving a high level of production and realizing the family's experience in a way that is as accurate as possible given the mandates of movie-making.

Robert Cox weighed in. “You just need to get to the truth beyond truths,” he offered, reflecting on his chosen field that figures so prominently into this truth-powered project, which shines greater light on a nation's dark days. “That’s why you work in journalism.”

Follow Maura Hogan on Twitter at @msmaurahogan.

Maura Hogan is the arts critic at The Post and Courier. She has previously written about arts, culture and lifestyle for The New York Times, Gourmet, Garden & Gun, among other publications.

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