Shattered Glass (2003)

Peter Sarsgaard: Charles 'Chuck' Lane

Photos 

Quotes 

• Stephen Glass : [Outside the closed restaurant]  I didn't do anything wrong, Chuck.

  Chuck Lane : I really wish you'd stop saying that.

• Caitlin Avey : [in the lobby of their office building]  What the hell did you do to Steve? He called me from his car, hysterical. I asked him what was wrong, he said, "ask Chuck?"

  Chuck Lane : [shouting]  I fired him, okay? Not suspended, fired. Because this wasn't an isolated incident Caitlin. He cooked a dozen of them, maybe more. And we're going to have to go through them, you and I. We're going to have to go through all of them, now.

  Caitlin Avey : No, the only one was Hack Heaven. He told me that himself.

  Chuck Lane : If he were a stranger to you, if he was a guy you were doing a piece about, pretend that guy told you he'd only did it once. Would you take his word for it? Of course not! You'd dig and you'd bury him! And you'd feel offended if anyone told you not to.

  Caitlin Avey : Every one of those pieces was fact-checked, they were all...

  Chuck Lane : So was Hack Heaven!

  Caitlin Avey : [pause] 

  Chuck Lane : You're a good reporter. You've always been such a smart and thorough reporter, why can't you be one now?

  Caitlin Avey : Cause what you're telling me just is impossible, Chuck.

  Chuck Lane : Go upstairs. Read 'em again.

  Caitlin Avey : This is bullshit!

  Chuck Lane : And make sure you go all the way back, because half of them ran when Mike was still here.

  Caitlin Avey : That's what this is. Of course. I mean, what are you going to do, Chuck, pick us off, one by one? Everybody that was loyal to Mike, till you have a staff that belongs to you? Is that the kind of magazine you want to run?

  Chuck Lane : Caitlin, when this thing blows, there isn't going to be a magazine anymore. If you want to make this about Mike, make it about Mike. I don't give a shit. You can resent me, you can hate me, but come Monday morning, we're all going to have to answer for what we let happen here. We're all going to have an apology to make! Jesus Christ! Don't you have any idea how much shit we're about to eat? Every competitor we ever took a shot at, they're going to pounce. And they should. Because we blew it, Caitlin. He handed us fiction after fiction and we printed them all as fact. Just because... we found him "entertaining." It's indefensible. Don't you know that?

  Chuck Lane : [Chuck leaves] 

• Stephen Glass : [in Stephen's office after business hours]  I don't know what you're talking about, okay? Those are all real people.

  Chuck Lane : They are?

  Stephen Glass : Yeah.

  Chuck Lane : Look at me... and say that again.

  Stephen Glass : Those are all real people.

• Stephen Glass : [Nervously]  Chuck? Um... the, uh, thing with George Sims? That was... the voice, the voice that you heard on the telephone... that was my brother. I'm sorry. There really is a George Sims. I, I, I've spoken to him a million times. He just... stopped talking to me. You know, because of the article. He was so mad about it. I didn't know what to do and the guys from Forbes were putting so much pressure on me, you know? And you were so mad. I just thought that if I could get everybody off my back, OK, for just a day, just a day would give me enough time to go and find him. You can understand that, can't you?

  Chuck Lane : You're fired, Steve.

  Stephen Glass : [startled]  What?

  Chuck Lane : You're fired. You've lost your job.

  Stephen Glass : [pleading]  But you can't.

• Chuck Lane : [Outside the closed restaurant]  It was ten people?

  Stephen Glass : Yes.

  Chuck Lane : For dinner?

  Stephen Glass : Yes.

  Chuck Lane : [Looking at the business hours sign]  They're closed at 3:00 on Sundays.

  Stephen Glass : Yeah, I know. I know, they almost didn't let us in. Okay? But it was a couple minutes before 3:00 and Ian looked like he was about ready to cry, and so they said okay.

  Chuck Lane : But for dinner?

  Stephen Glass : Go in and ask them yourself, Chuck. Okay? Go in and see if they would serve a party that came in at 2:58 and the answer would be yes, because that's when we got here.

  Chuck Lane : The Forbes guys are going to have all this too...

  Stephen Glass : [speaking at the same time]  I didn't do anything wrong, Chuck.

  Chuck Lane : ...and they're going to dig through the records of that office building. I'm sure they have surveillance cameras and they're going to check them.

  Stephen Glass : I didn't do anything wrong, Chuck!

  Chuck Lane : I really wish you'd stop saying that!

  Chuck Lane : Steve... come on, anyone can make a mistake.

  Stephen Glass : You know, this is not right, Chuck! Okay, I feel really attacked. And you're my editor. You're supposed to support me and you're taking their word against mine? You're supposed to support me!

• Chuck Lane : [in Stephen's office after business hours]  You had your brother pose as George Sims.

  Stephen Glass : What?

  Chuck Lane : The phony recording from Jukt Micronics? It's a Palo Alto number. And your brother is a student at Stanford. You had him pose as Sims.

  Stephen Glass : No, Sims is a real guy...

  Chuck Lane : Steve, Steve...

  Stephen Glass : I've talked to him a million times, Chuck. My brother and I aren't even speaking right now.

  Chuck Lane : Stop it. You faked Sims, you faked a website, you faked all those voicemails...

  Stephen Glass : [speaking at the same time]  You don't know. You don't know, Chuck.

  Chuck Lane : Restil, Hiert, Ghort...

  Stephen Glass : [speaking at the same time]  You got this totally backward.

  Chuck Lane : It's all crap. I can trace it if you make me. I'll find it all billed to you.

• Gloria : [referring to the discovery that Stephen fabricated his stories]  You know what could've prevented all this, don't you?

  Chuck Lane : No, what?

  Gloria : Pictures. How could you make up characters if everyone you wrote about had to be photographed?

• Stephen Glass : [in front of the magazine display case]  Chuck, will you please take me to the airport?

  Chuck Lane : Jesus.

  Stephen Glass : Please, OK? You don't have to talk to me if you don't want to. It's fine. But I can't be by myself right now. OK? I'm, uh, I'm afraid of what I'm gonna do. You know? I... I can't get there by myself.

  Chuck Lane : I'm not going anywhere with you. Now, if you feel like you're a danger to yourself, you can sit down for a few minutes until you feel calm enough to go, but I am not going anywhere with you.

  Stephen Glass : But... I'm afraid that I'm gonna do something, OK? Did you hear what I said?

  Chuck Lane : Yeah. It's a hell of a story.

  Stephen Glass : Chuck, please.

  Chuck Lane : Stop pitching, Steve. It's over.

• Chuck Lane : [during a litigation meeting]  We've read through all the pieces now, the entire staff, and we've come up with a list of those whose facts and sources we couldn't verify independently. I know you can't admit guilt of any kind but I want you to confirm a few titles for me.

  Glass' Lawyer : We're not prepared to confirm or deny anything at this time.

  Chuck Lane : What I'm going to do is this, I'm going to read to you a list of suspicious titles, one by one. If you raise an objection to a particular title, we'll fact check it again in the hope of removing it from the list. If you remain silent we'll assume that piece is fabricated either partially or entirely, and it'll stay on. Is that clear to everyone?

  Chuck Lane : Okay.

  [Chuck reads from the list] 

  Chuck Lane : "Hazardous To Your Mental Health."

  [Stephen remains silent] 

  Chuck Lane : That means it stays on the list of suspicious pieces, fabricated pieces.

  Glass' Lawyer : We understand, can we move along?

  Chuck Lane : [Chuck continues to reads from the list]  "Holy Trinity," "Probable Clause," "Don't You D.A.R.E.," "Spring Breakdown," "State of Nature," "Rock The Morons," "After The Fall"...

• Stephen Glass : [In his car]  There's been so much pressure. I, I... Chuck, I didn't mean to get anybody in trouble.

  Chuck Lane : OK. OK. You weren't at the conference.

  Stephen Glass : [finally admitting he fabricated his story "Hack Heaven"]  No. You know, I had a description of it from so many sources, I thought I had it solid. OK? And I wanted the piece to have an eyewitness feel to it. For color. So I said I had been there myself.

  Chuck Lane : [referring to the conference call they had earlier that day]  And everything we just told the Forbes guys?

  Stephen Glass : I, I... I'm so sorry, Chuck. I just panicked. If you want me to say that I made it up, I will. If that'll help you, I'll say it.

  Chuck Lane : I just want you to tell me the truth, Steve. Can you do that?

• Chuck Lane : We need to take a drive to Bethesda.

  Stephen Glass : What for?

  Chuck Lane : I want to meet Joe Hiert.

  Stephen Glass : I already told you, nobody knows where he is.

  Chuck Lane : Well, maybe if we go to the hotel where he met with Restil and Sims, someone will remember him and have some clue how to find him.

  Stephen Glass : [speaking at the same time]  Chuck, there were hundreds of people there, okay?

  Chuck Lane : These Forbes guys want to come down on you.

  Stephen Glass : [speaking at the same time]  This is ridiculous.

  Chuck Lane : They are highly suspicious about some of the material in that article. You know that.

  Stephen Glass : Yeah.

  Chuck Lane : But they're going to go online with their piece tomorrow.

  Stephen Glass : Oh.

  Chuck Lane : OK?

  Stephen Glass : Yeah.

  Chuck Lane : Now, Steve... Steve.

  Stephen Glass : Yeah?

  Chuck Lane : If we can find Hiert, I can back them off for a day or two. OK?

  Stephen Glass : Ok, I'll get my notes.

  Chuck Lane : OK.

  Stephen Glass : [after grabbing the notes]  Let's go.

  Chuck Lane : All right.

• Chuck Lane : [During a conference call, over the speakerphone, responding to Kambiz Foroohar's and Adam Penenberg's suspicions after seeing Stephen's fake website]  How so?

  Kambiz Foroohar : Quite frankly, it doesn't look like a real website. Looks like a site that was created to fool someone.

  Chuck Lane : I don't know much about computers, could somebody do that?

  Kambiz Foroohar : Of course.

  Adam Penenberg : Very easily.

  Kambiz Foroohar : So easily, in fact, it's incredible.

  Stephen Glass : [after looking through his notes]  Hey, do you guys still want that number for, uh, Jim Ghort? Because I just found it in my notes.

  Adam Penenberg : Yeah, sure.

  Stephen Glass : All right, 605-64...

  Adam Penenberg : [politely interrupts him]  Oh wait.

  Stephen Glass : Sorry?

  Adam Penenberg : [referring to the zip code]  Uh... six zero five, that's not Nevada.

  Stephen Glass : [realizing he's been caught lying]  Oh.

  Stephen Glass : [after exhaling and pretending to be looking through his notes, trying to cover up his lie]  I guess I got him mixed up with another source. Uh... sorry about that one. Oh, you know what it was? Jim Ghort was actually the guy who told me about the law enforcement officials. Um... I don't know what I was thinking. I'm gonna have to...

  Chuck Lane : [interrupts him]  Steve. Give them the number.

• David Bach : [over the phone]  Look, I'm really sorry to bother you at night but it seemed important.

  Chuck Lane : It's fine, is there a problem?

  David Bach : Well, I don't know. I just got off the phone with Stephen. He sounds horrible. Did you suspend him, Chuck?

  Chuck Lane : David, what is the problem?

  David Bach : He asked me if I would drive him out to Dulles later tonight, he said he wasn't sure he'd be safe driving by himself. I thought I should draw your attention to that.

  Chuck Lane : Did he say where he was going?

  David Bach : Yeah, he said he'd be staying with his family for a while. That could only be one of two places.

  Chuck Lane : His parents live in Highland Park, right?

  David Bach : Yeah, or his brother out in Palo Alto.

  Chuck Lane : [Surprised]  I'm sorry?

  David Bach : His brother at Stanford.

• Chuck Lane : [Seeing the apology letter issued the New Republic and signed by its staff]  It's funny, because I thought I was going to have to explain all this to you.

  [everyone applauds] 

• Chuck Lane : [Over the phone]  Can we have a talk here? Just editor to editor?

  Kambiz Foroohar : Sure, go ahead.

  Chuck Lane : Completely off the record and really almost human being to human being?

  Kambiz Foroohar : Of course.

  Chuck Lane : You guys have discovered something that a troubled kid has done. But I still don't know how you plan to play it.

  Kambiz Foroohar : Chuck, we're not in the business of "gotcha" journalism here. I have no interest in embarrassing you or The New Republic.

  Chuck Lane : I'm not worried about me or the magazine. That's fair game. But there's a kid here who basically just plainly screwed up. Big time. His reporting was sloppy. We know that. But we're trying to handle it internally at this point. Just as you would.

  Kambiz Foroohar : Listen... we're going to run something along the lines of a trick was pulled, and some very clever hackers managed to create an illusion.

  Chuck Lane : I can't tell you what to print or not to print. You guys are journalists. But he could be very hurt by what you guys publish. His career.

  Kambiz Foroohar : Chuck, I understand. I do. I would hope if I made the mistakes he made people would be generous with me. But this concerns the very field we cover. We have to run it. And when we do, we're gonna need a comment from you, so, given everything that's happened, how strongly are you going to stand behind this story?

  Chuck Lane : [Looking at the fake business card]  I'm looking into it.

• Stephen Glass : [Explaining to Chuck where the "people" in his fabricated article "sat" during their "meeting"]  We were at this table. Restil sat here, his mother was on his left. Hiert... Sorry, his mother was on his right. Hiert sat there, but then Restil wanted him closer so he slid his chair over. Sims sat here. He had a lawyer next to him. I forgot the guy's name. It's in my notes. Somebody was smoking at this table, so then Restil's mother insisted that we move to one farther away. Over there.

  Chuck Lane : The hacker conference was near here, right?

  Stephen Glass : Yeah, the building next door.

  Chuck Lane : [At the supposed conference site]  I don't remember from the article. How many people did you say were at this thing?

  Stephen Glass : Uh, looked like a hundred. Might have been two. It's in my notes.

  Chuck Lane : [Looking around the conference hall]  Two hundred people? Here?

  Stephen Glass : Yeah, they moved in and out. I mean, most of them were kids.

  Chuck Lane : That doesn't seem credible to me.

  Stephen Glass : All I know is I was here. All of us were right here.

  Security Guard : Excuse me, sir, can I help you?

  Chuck Lane : Yes, you can. We're looking into a conference that was held here a couple Sundays ago. Computer hackers. Do you remember anything like that?

  Security Guard : Are you sure you're in the right building, sir?

  Stephen Glass : Yes, we're sure.

  Chuck Lane : Why is that?

  Security Guard : Building's closed on Sunday.

  Stephen Glass : [Chuck sternly looks at Stephen]  All I know is I was here. The conference was right here. That's why the Restils only stayed a few minutes, OK? Because it was such a dumb place to squeeze into.

• Lewis Estridge : [talking privately in the break room]  All I'm suggesting is that there might be facets of this that you're not considering.

  Chuck Lane : Why are you defending him?

  Lewis Estridge : Nobody is defending him, Chuck.

  Chuck Lane : Of course you're defending him.

  Lewis Estridge : He's a kid.

  Chuck Lane : He doctored his notes, Lew. Just consider that for a second, you know? He sat down, and he hand-wrote a bunch of phony quotes, and then he handed them in as source material for the fact-check. Doesn't that offend you?

  Lewis Estridge : Of course it does.

  Chuck Lane : He also lied to his editor. That's supposed to offend you, too.

  Lewis Estridge : He's a confused, distraught kid, obviously, Chuck. So suspend him for a couple of months, but let's not bury him.

  Chuck Lane : [Shaking his head]  Suspend him.

  Lewis Estridge : There are also political considerations to take into account here. The rest of the staff, the way they feel about him.

  Chuck Lane : I... I already know all that.

  Lewis Estridge : What I'm saying is if you fire him, some of these people will leave. I don't know if we'd still have a magazine at the end of the day.

• Marty Peretz : [Over the phone]  I'm in a bit of an uncomfortable situation, Chuck. I thought you might be able to help me out.

  Chuck Lane : Sure.

  Marty Peretz : It's about Mike.

  Chuck Lane : Oh.

  Marty Peretz : He and I... well, it hasn't been working out for some time now, as you know. The tone of the magazine... I think it's gotten too nasty. It's strayed from the traditions that make it great. And I'm going to be making changes.

  Chuck Lane : I see.

  Marty Peretz : I'd like you to step in for him, Chuck. I'd like you to become editor.

  Chuck Lane : Editor?

  Marty Peretz : There's a catch, of course. Mike doesn't know any of this yet. It's going to be two or three days before I tell him, so it'll have to remain between us until then. Will that be a problem for you?

  Chuck Lane : Marty, Mike's a friend.

  Marty Peretz : I appreciate that, Chuck, but I can't remove him until I know who's going to be his replacement. For continuity's sake, so this is how it has to be.

  Chuck Lane : I'm going to have to think about this. I'm going to have to discuss it with Catarina.

  Marty Peretz : Oh, of course, of course. Listen...

  Chuck Lane : Marty, have you thought about the impact this might have on the staff? They feel very... he's earned a lot of loyalty there.

  Marty Peretz : Yes, mostly by fighting with me.

  Chuck Lane : Well, the point is I haven't earned that kind of loyalty.