Matt Tyrnauer at Film Forum in NYC on Friday, September 20, 2019 (Image by Matthew Rettenmund)

Roy Cohn (1927-1986) was one of the most heinous villains of the 20th century, a vile, self-loathing, aggressive, self-aggrandizing, corrupt liar who helped fan the flames of McCarthyism, who defended murderous mobsters, who mentored consequential toads like Roger Stone and Donald Trump, who received special treatment from AIDS-denialist Ronald Reagan when battling AIDS himself, and on and on.

So why should you make time to see a documentary on his life? Answer: Because instead of being buried in history like he is interred in a Queens mausoleum, Cohn is basically POTUS now. We are so forgetful that all the negativity Cohn espoused and caused is not only still with us, it has risen to the highest office in the land.

One way to defeat it is to open our eyes to where it came from, and to how it is still being created.

Review of Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood HERE

In Matt Tyrnauer's (Valentino: The Last Emperor, Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood, Studio 54) visionary documentary Where's My Roy Cohn? (out now in NYC and L.A.), we are re-introduced to the demonic Cohn, this time with more blanks filled in. If you are old enough to remember the man, you may not know the fascinating dynamics of his family, vividly depicted here. You may remember the McCarthy Hearings without being as informed on the topic of the Army-McCarthy Hearings. In the latter, Cohn was investigated by the Senate for his brazen corruption in seeking special treatment for his beloved friend, David Schine, a McCarthy aide and hotel heir, when Schine was drafted into the armed services. The questioning was intense, and contained one of the first, if not the first, oblique references to homosexuality ever aired on U.S. television, when chief counsel of the Army Joseph Welch pointedly took McCarthy's feigned misunderstanding of the word “pixie” as an opportunity to reply, “A pixie is a close relative of a fairy,” deftly slamming Cohn as gay in an era when being gay was so verboten that Cohn himself had built part of his career on slurring homosexuality as un-American.

History of LGBTQ References on TV HERE

Tyrnauer's skillful selection of archival materials draws a full and complete portrait of Cohn as a spoiled only child who, in spite of being raised by Democrats, quickly became attracted to power and aroused by viciousness, a man who knew the secret to survival — McCarthy was ruined by his hearings, Cohn was not — was to never apologize, to lie about anything and everything, and to charm and manipulate the media by feeding them quotes so the headlines would be his own misinformation.

Sound familiar?

In fact, Where's My Roy Cohn? effortlessly reveals how Cohn has given us a president from beyond the grave, thanks to the fact that closet-case Cohn — who seemed to have been romantically enamored of Trump — mentored Donald Trump for years, even bringing him a win against all odds in a racial bias case brought against his company.

The film, making use of candid interviews with Cohn's dishy relatives and even with the odious Roger Stone, explores Cohn's duality — gay man who hated gay men, a man with AIDS who swore he did not have AIDS — and calls out the 30+ powerful people (including Barbara Walters) who defended him as an honorable man when he was finally getting disbarred for his flagrantly unlawful, unethical behavior.

Where's My Roy Cohn? might piss you off, but it won't leave you disinterested, and it could get you even more fired up to help ensure that the U.S. dumps Trump before the country is ruined by him for generations. It's not hyperbole to think it's possible for Trump to destroy his own country in the way that Cohn tried to, and in the way that Cohn destroyed himself, and this documentary reveals why.

Don't sleep on this. We've slept on the legacy of Cohn for far too long.

Videos of Tyrnauer's talk-back after the 7:00 p.m. screening of his film at Film Forum in NYC on September 20, 2019: