White House Plumbers (Season 1) Episode 1: The Watergate scandal has been depicted on screen numerous times, but HBO’s new miniseries, White House Plumbers, directed by David Mandel, offers a unique take on the political drama.
Starring Woody Harrelson as Howard Hunt and Justin Theroux as Gordon Liddy, the show’s comedic and satirical tone sets it apart from other adaptations. The series focuses on the two men’s absurd plan to break into the Democratic National Committee’s Watergate office, with the first episode delving into their initial meeting and secret mission.
Here is an in-depth recap of the first episode of White House Plumbers, detailing the events that take place throughout the runtime, concluding with a detailed explanation of the final sequence. Please note that there are spoilers ahead, so proceed with precaution:
White House Plumbers (HBO Miniseries) Episode 1 Recap:
Episode 1: The Beverly Hills Burglary
The episode opens with a team trying to break into the Watergate office. An introduction tells us that this is one of the many break-ins that happened at Watergate. This failed attempt is marked as the second time someone tried to break in.
This show then introduces us to E. Howard Hunt, a Former CIA agent who is working at Mullen & Co. Public Relations, a year ago from the break-in. He is clearly unhappy with his job, and back home, he has nothing important to do.
Just then, Howard gets a recruitment phone call from the white house asking him to handle the Pentagon papers leak to the media by Daniel Ellsberg. This man has shared top-secret papers from the Department of Defense with journalists. They revealed how much the USA was involved in the Vietnam War. This had upset President Nixon and the government., leading them to increase security and imply alternate ways to keep secrets safe in the future.
To avoid any more leaks, Howard is paired with a former FBI agent named G. Gordon Liddy. They are both tasked with reporting their progress and providing detailed information to Egil Krogh, who leads the Special Intelligence Unit (SIU).
After the FBI refuses to administer polygraph tests to 500 individuals regarding the leak, Howard proposes a daring plan: breaking into the office of Daniel Ellsberg’s psychoanalyst, Lewis J. Fielding, to photograph his files and prove that he is a foreign agent. Howard and his partner Liddy travel to Los Angeles, California, to locate Fielding’s office in Beverly Hills.
The two have the intention to get Ellsberg’s medical file so they can investigate him and discredit him as a whistleblower. To avoid suspicion, the duo pretends to be tourists with the help of a CIA agent. They take photos around the doctor’s office, but their disguises are not very convincing. They bribe a maid working at the facility to let them into Dr. Fielding’s office, where Liddy takes photos of everything, including the cabinets where patients’ files are kept. After scouting the location, they return to Washington, D.C., to report their findings to Krogh.
Impressed by their success, Krogh approves of their plan and forms a group called the White House Plumbers to carry out their operations. This marks the beginning of a series of covert and illegal activities, including the Watergate break-in, which we all know ultimately leads to the downfall of the Nixon administration.
What do we know about the two main characters of White House Plumbers – Howard and Gordon?
Howard Hunt is a Republican who dislikes liberal ideologies and blames former President Kennedy for the CIA’s failure in handling Cuba. He believes himself to be a patriot and is competitive with Gordon, who shares a similar belief in the well-being of the nation.
Howard is uncomfortable with the influence of hippie culture on his children and is agitated by anti-war protests. His wife, Dorothy, is an active CIA asset who assists him in ghostwriting spy novels and supports him in his tactics and beliefs. Their daughter, who was scarred in an accident, desires to drop out of college.
Gordon Liddy is heavily inspired by Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich (the character was given more depth in the STARZ show Gaslit), though he does not agree with all of their tactics. He keeps records of Hitler’s speeches in his home and uses them for entertainment.
Gordon is obsessed with good lineage due to his wife’s Celtic genes. He has a violent approach to those who do not agree with him, likely due to his experience with childhood bullying. As a child, he listened to Hitler’s speeches on the radio and was inspired by his character to stand up for himself.
What strategy do Howard and Gordon devise to obtain Ellsberg’s file?
The next plan of action includes them stealing Ellsberg’s file. In the meantime, we understand that there was a file on Ellsberg because doctors usually keep records of their patients. However, Dr. Fielding refused to give the file to the authorities when they asked for it. He said that there was a strict confidentiality rule between doctors and patients, especially for therapy sessions.
Krogh gave Howard and Gordon permission to continue their mission, so they returned to Beverly Hills with more resources. However, they were not allowed to break into the office themselves because it could cause a big scandal if they were caught.
So Howard hired some of his old Cuban contacts, including Felipe De Diego, Rolando Martinez, and Bernard Barker, who are all exiles. They have known Howard since his CIA days during the Bay of Pigs invasion plan. The three of them agree to break into Dr. Fielding’s office to get Ellsberg’s file for free so they can gain favor with the intelligence agency.
Howard and Gordon follow the doctor from his office to his home to make sure he doesn’t leave. After they confirm that he was staying at home, Gordon returns to the office and keeps watch while the Cubans attempted to break in and find the file.
Although Howard and Gordon trust their plan and the men they hired, things go terribly wrong on both sides when the Cubans discover that the office door is locked. They don’t have the right tools to break it open, so they decided to enter the building through a different entrance at Gordon’s suggestion.
The Cubans’ idea is not very smart because they have to break into another office in the building to get to their target, and they end up making a mess of Dr. Fielding’s entire office. Despite this, they still can’t locate Ellsberg’s file.
Meanwhile, Howard loses track of the situation and discovers that Fielding has left his home. He quickly returns to Gordon and the others, and they have to abort their mission and leave immediately.
The original plan was to break into the office discreetly and retrieve the file without leaving any evidence of a break-in. However, the Cubans’ actions had the opposite effect and made the situation worse. To add insult to injury, they tried to cover up their break-in by staging it as if drug addicts had ransacked the cabinets before fleeing the scene.
In their hotel room at the base, when Howard and Liddy question the Cubans about what went wrong with the mission, Liddy asks them why they would stage the break-in as if drug addicts had done it since real drug addicts would have taken the drugs they came for and not left them behind.
White House Plumbers (HBO Miniseries) Episode 1 Ending, Explained:
What permission does John Dean give to Howard and Gordon?
Howard and Liddy have a heated disagreement about the failed mission, with both of them blaming each other for the outcome. They are unwilling to report back to the EOB without the file and consider one more mission to search Dr. Fielding’s house for it.
However, things take a turn for the worse when they find out that Egil Krogh, the head of the SIU, has been replaced by the White House Counsel, John Dean. As a result, both Howard and Gordon are fired from the unit.
However, Dean is immensely impressed by Howard and Gordon’s unconventional tactics and offers Gordon a position on a different committee. Howard, on the other hand, becomes an advisor.
The committee that they are a part of – The Committee to Re-elect the President has the goal of securing Nixon’s victory in the upcoming election. Dean promises unlimited funds for tactics such as sabotage, infiltration, and surveillance, and Howard and Gordon propose a budget of one million dollars which Dean approves.
The two men begin their new roles; unaware that their actions will lead to what we know as one of the major political scandals of all time.
