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Start giftingThe Watergate
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Learn moreSince its opening in 1965, the Watergate complex has been one of Washington’s chicest addresses, a home to power brokers from both political parties and the epicenter of a scandal that brought down a president. In The Watergate, writer and political consultant Joseph Rodota paints a vivid portrait of this landmark and the movers and shakers who have lived there.
Watergate residents—an intriguing casts of politicians, journalists, socialites and spies—have been at the center of America’s political storms for half a century. The irrepressible Martha Mitchell, wife of President Nixon’s attorney general and campaign manager John Mitchell, captivated the nation with a stream of outrageous interviews and phone calls from her Watergate duplex. Supreme Court justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Antonin Scalia put aside their differences many a New Year’s Eve to celebrate together at the Watergate, dining on wild game hunted by Scalia and cooked by Ginsburg’s husband. Monica Lewinsky hunkered down in her mother’s Watergate apartment while President Clinton fought impeachment; her neighbor US Senator Bob Dole brought donuts to the hordes of reporters camped out front. Years after Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice hosted chamber music concerts in her Watergate living room, guests remembered the soaring music—and the cheap snacks.
Rodota unlocks the mysteries of the Watergate, including why Elizabeth Taylor refused to move into a Watergate apartment with her sixth husband; reveals a surprising connection between the Watergate and Ronald Reagan; and unravels how the Nixon break-in transformed the Watergate’s reputation and spawned generations of "-gate” scandals, from Koreagate to Deflategate.
The Washington Post once called the Watergate a “glittering Potomac Titanic." Like the famous ocean liner, the Watergate was ahead of its time, filled with boldface names—and ultimately doomed. The Watergate is a captivating inside look at the passengers and crew of this legendary building.
Joseph Rodota is a writer and consultant who has worked at the highest levels of politics in Washington, DC, and California. He worked in the Reagan White House and as a top aide to California governors Pete Wilson and Arnold Schwarzenegger, and has written for the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Huffington Post and other outlets. He lives in Sacramento, California, where his play Chessman, about the final days of the “Red Light Bandit” Caryl Chessman, premiered at B Street Theatre.
Bronson Pinchot, Audible’s Narrator of the Year for 2010, has won Publishers Weekly Listen-Up Awards, AudioFile Earphones Awards, Audible’s Book of the Year Award, and Audie Awards for several audiobooks, including Matterhorn, Wise Blood, Occupied City, and The Learners. A magna cum laude graduate of Yale, he is an Emmy- and People’s Choice-nominated veteran of movies, television, and Broadway and West End shows. His performance of Malvolio in Twelfth Night was named the highlight of the entire two-year Kennedy Center Shakespeare Festival by the Washington Post. He attended the acting programs at Shakespeare & Company and Circle-in-the-Square, logged in well over 200 episodes of television, starred or costarred in a bouquet of films, plays, musicals, and Shakespeare on Broadway and in London, and developed a passion for Greek revival architecture.
Reviews
“Tells the story of this incredible ‘city within a city’…[and] invites the reader to be a fly on the wall.”
“As author Joseph Rodota shows in his excellent new book The Watergate: Inside America’s Most Infamous Address, life in the Watergate didn’t always match the hype of its developers, although the intrigue inside the buildings often outstripped anyone’s imagination…[He] captures the absurdity of some of the Watergate’s most notorious residents…taking readers inside the hulking buildings to show the people and characters inside.”
“Does a good job of mixing historical facts with personal anecdotes to tell the story of what was both the most famous and most infamous hotel in Washington, DC.”
“Meticulously chronicles the buildings’ biography, including gossipy accounts of various residents (from socialite Anna Chennault to Monica Lewinsky) and, of course, details of the historic burglary.”
“A fascinating account, part history, part society page, which will appeal to a wide audience of general readers and those intrigued by architectural history.”
“Entertaining, gossip-filled….The author profiles the personalities and interior design choices of many famous, and sometimes notorious, Watergate residents: politicians, lawyers, doctors, diplomats, and businessmen…A richly detailed history of a site awarded landmark status.”
“Mixes history, finance, and high-level political gossip to evoke the Watergate complex’s mystique.”
“Sure to appeal to architecture and political junkies alike…a thorough and thoroughly engrossing insider account of this legendary Washington address.”
“If walls could talk…Joseph Rodota reports what those in the world-famous Watergate complex have been discussing. Read for yourself—you won’t be disappointed.”
“Joseph Rodota gives us the definitive history of the Watergate complex. Crime sleuths, politicos, fans of the rich and powerful, architects, gossipers, and renters everywhere will find The Watergate a fascinating and rewarding read. Rodota’s extraordinary eye for juicy detail made me feel as if I were peeking over the shoulders of the Watergate residents—and burglars. If you think you knew the Watergate story, you haven’t read this.”
“Joseph Rodota has written an engaging biography of a building—the Watergate—whose name is forever linked with the politics, intrigue, and power of Washington.”
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