10 Disturbing True Stories Behind Famous Movies
4. Newscaster Christine Chubbuck Committed Suicide On-Air - Network
Sidney Lumet's masterful, Oscar-winning 1976 satire Network is centered around evening newscaster Howard Beale (Peter Finch), who after learning that he's being taken off the air due to declining ratings, announces on live TV that he will commit suicide during an upcoming broadcast.
Ultimately this never happens, though Beale does still die on air, after the network's executives arrange for him to be assassinated in order to boost their ratings.
The whole scenario might sound like fantastical, deliciously fiery satire, but it's actually inspired by the real-life story of Christine Chubbuck, a newscaster who committed suicide during a live report in 1974, just two years before Network's release.
Much like Beale, Chubbuck expressed distaste with the increasingly lurid, exploitative state of news media, and in a statement seconds before she shot herself on-air, said:
"In keeping with the WXLT practice of presenting the most immediate and complete reports of local blood and guts news, TV 40 presents what is believed to be a television first. In living color, an exclusive coverage of an attempted suicide."
Chubbuck's story was immortalised more directly on screen in 2016 with Antonio Campos' terrific drama Christine, where Chubbuck was portrayed quite phenomenally by Rebecca Hall.