Story of Boston Globe team who exposed sex abuse in Catholic Church hits big screen

Dreamworks and Participant have bought life rights to the story about the newspaper's Spotlight Team

Published April 3, 2013 8:36PM (EDT)

Dreamworks has bought life rights to the story of the Boston Globe's Spotlight Team, who in 2003 won a Pulitzer Prize for Public Service for exposing sexual abuse in the Catholic Church. "The Boston Globe's coverage of the Catholic priest scandal opened the door to a bigger story that had worldwide ramifications," said DreamWorks president Holly Bario.

From the Hollywood Reporter:

Life rights have been acquired to the Boston Globe's "Spotlight Team" of reporters and editors, including then-Globe editor Marty Baron, special projects editor Ben Bradlee Jr., Spotlight Team editor Walter "Robby" Robinson and reporters Michael Rezendes, Sacha Pfeiffer and Matt Carroll.

The team spent a year interviewing victims and reviewing thousands of pages of documents and discovered years of cover-up by Church leadership. Their reporting eventually led to the resignation of Cardinal Bernard Law, who had hidden years of serial abuse by other priests and opened the floodgates to other revelations of molestation and cover-ups around the world that still reverberate today.

Tom McCarthy will direct and co-write the script with Josh Singer, THR reports. Boston Magazine already has some casting suggestions for the Globe reporters.


By Prachi Gupta

Prachi Gupta is an Assistant News Editor for Salon, focusing on pop culture. Follow her on Twitter at @prachigu or email her at pgupta@salon.com.

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Boston Globe Catholic Church Dreamworks Film Movies Sex Abuse