POTTSTOWN PA – A free screening of the documentary film “Stripped for Parts: American Journalism on the Brink” will be shown April 8 (2025; Tuesday) at The Hill School Center for the Arts, 766 Beech St.
The screening begins at 6 p.m., and a panel discussion will follow. It is scheduled to include the film’s director, Academy Award-nominated film maker Rick Goldsmith; Mercury reporter Evan Brandt, former Mercury Sports Editor Austin Hertzog, and Bill Ross, executive director of the News Guild of Greater Philadelphia.
The film is the story of how a financial hedge fund, Alden Global Capital – which owns The Mercury, Pottstown’s local paper – is “plundering” local newspapers nationwide, according to industry observers. It also reports how journalists are fighting back. This screening is sponsored by The Newspaper Guild-CWA Local 38010.
Goldsmith says he became aware of the situation after reading an article sent to him by legendary journalist Bill Moyers.
“Three things from the article jumped out at me. First was the notion that profits were to be made by ‘wrecking’ journalism, rather than practicing it. Why? Second was the revelation that money could be made from an industry seemingly in collapse. How? Third — and this is what hooked me — was that newspapermen and women in Colorado were in apparent open revolt against their own publisher.”
“Now that’s news!,” adds Goldsmith. Watch a trailer for the film online.
‘A Good, Socially Conscious Documentary’
“Stripped for Parts does exactly what a good, socially conscious documentary should do,” says Victor Pickard, professor of media policy and political economy at the University of Pennsylvania. “It identifies an urgent problem, explains how we got here, why it matters, and, most important, considers what we should do about it.”
Everything that happens to newspapers in the film has happened to The Mercury, members of its staff report.
For eight decades, The Mercury was a robust, crusading local newspaper, its advocates say. It also is the smallest circulation paper in the nation ever to win two Pulitzer Prizes.
With Alden Global Capital taking ownership, The Mercury is following the same pattern as all 76 local dailies and more than 300 weekly newspapers Alden now controls, they add. Its building was rented to an Alden subsidiary as it fell into disrepair, and then was sold. The staff has been reduced to a fraction of its former workforce.
Many readers acknowledge the paper is filled with stories from outside news outlets, as well as with articles from other papers Alden owns. Locally, Alden owns familiar mastheads including The Reading Eagle, The Allentown Morning Call, The Norristown Times-Herald, The Daily Local News in Chester County, The Reporter in Lansdale, and The Delware County Daily Times.
Third In A Trilogy of Films
Experts agree the print newspaper business model has struggled during the past 20 years, as America’s media landscape has transformed. Adapting to that new landscape has become more difficult, the same experts suggest, as Alden siphons revenue from profitable, often debt-free publications.
Among those on the list are The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times, and The Denver Post. Staff members there who are said to have revolted against its owner became the trigger for Goldsmith’s film.
“Stripped for Parts: American Journalism on the Brink” (2023) is the third in a trilogy of films with journalism themes, following “Tell the Truth and Run: George Seldes and the American Press,” (1996) and “The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers” (2009), co-produced and co-directed with Judith Ehrlich.
Both were nominated for Academy Awards for Best Documentary Feature. “Most Dangerous Man” also won a Peabody Award.
Photos provided to Travels With The Post by
Rick Goldsmith from “Stripped for Parts: American Journalism on the Brink“
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