Goofs

Murrow's cigarette grows longer (while the ash gets shorter) during the meeting where Paley reschedules his show to Sundays.

In the opening sequence two shots show a twin-lens reflex camera being handed about. A moment later, a group photo is taken, presumably with the same camera) and a flash frame indicates the camera had a flash, but it didn't.

In the middle of the film, when Wershba is with his wife in their house getting ready for work, he forgets his wedding ring and his wife has to remind him to take it, the top button of his shirt becomes buttoned and his tie is tied tighter by itself as he turns around to get his wedding ring. There wasn't enough time for him to button his shirt and tighten his tie.

When Eddie Scott (Matt Ross) and the others are in the bar celebrating, he has a cigarette in his mouth, then loses the cigarette, then the cigarette reappears again all under a few seconds.

When the CBS staff is watching See It Now (1951) on a regular TV set, the set is tuned to Channel 10. In New York this ran on Channel 2.

Jesse Zousmer and John Aaron are shown participating in See It Now editorial and production meetings. Zousmer and Aaron produced Person to Person and wrote Murrow's nightly radio newscast. They were not involved in See It Now.

Mr. Paley calls Murrow to offer front row seats to the Knickerbocker game just before See It Now goes on the air that night. While the New York Knickerbockers did have a game on March 9, 1954, the night of the broadcast, the game was played in Indianapolis, Indiana, not New York City.

See It Now aired on CBS from 10:30 to 10:59. Twice Don Hollenbeck is shown doing the 11:00pm local news immediately following (which is correct). But Hollenbeck is also shown coming to the studio to chat with Murrow following a Person to Person broadcast, which also aired in the 10:30 time slot, and not doing the local New York news.

It was originally thought by many viewers that the "CBS News" sign on the wall is set in Helvetica, a typeface which was first created in 1957, three years after the Joseph McCarthy broadcast. Subsequent investigation by typographers established that the typeface is actually correct and is Akzidenz Grotesk.

Mention is made of the hotline telephone between Moscow and Washington, but this was installed in 1963, five years after Edward R. Murrow's speech and ten years after the bulk of the film. (Fidel Castro's revolution hadn't even occurred at the time the film is set).

There is a plastic water bottle on the desk in the newsroom when Friendly, Wershba, and Murrow are standing around and talking.

The U.S. Air Force officers are shown wearing modern, brushed metal name tags. Air Force personnel did not wear name tags until the blue plastic ones were introduced in 1967. Also officers are not authorized silver chin straps on the service hat - only plain leather ones (even in 1954). These are used for ceremonial duties only.

In several of the scenes with telephone conversations the phones being used were models not introduced until years later and at least twice the handsets use the detachable cord with the RJ-11 plug which was introduced by Bell in the 1970s.

The piano shown behind jazz singer Dianne Reeves displays the "Steinway" logo on the side - it would not have been displayed on the side of models at that time.

An adjoining studio is shown with a signer and orchestra and a title card for Shower of Stars, a CBS variety program from 1954 to 1958. The program was broadcast from Television City in Los Angeles, not from New York.

Film shows CBS Studio 41, See It Now's offices and editing rooms, and CBS executive offices as appearing in the same building. Studio 41 was located above the waiting room at Grand Central Terminal. The program's offices were located in the Graybar Building next to Grand Central. Executive offices were at 485 Madison Avenue.

Bill Paley says to Murrow: "I'm taking your program from a half an hour to an hour." In fact, the program went from an hour to a half hour.