Bag Man

Rachel Maddow's Bag Man asks a question that sounds almost impossible: could an American Vice President run a criminal bribery operation out of the White House and have the whole thing basically forgotten by history? The answer, it turns out, is yes. The seven-episode series reconstructs the 1973 scandal surrounding Vice President Spiro Agnew, who was taking cash bribes in his office — literal envelopes of money — while simultaneously serving as Richard Nixon's number two. Maddow tracked down the original federal prosecutors who built the case against Agnew and recorded extensive interviews with them, many speaking publicly about the investigation for the first time. The result is a story that feels like it should be fiction. You have a sitting Vice President threatening prosecutors, attempting to get journalists fired, and trying to convince members of Congress to shut down the investigation on his behalf. Maddow narrates with the energy she brings to her TV work but dials it back enough for the medium. She is clearly fascinated by the material, and that enthusiasm is infectious without being overwhelming. The show earned a 4.8-star rating from nearly 28,000 reviews and picked up a Peabody nomination, a duPont-Columbia Award, and a Hillman Prize. At just seven episodes plus a bonus update, it is compact enough to finish in an afternoon. The parallels to modern political scandals are impossible to miss, though Maddow mostly lets listeners draw those connections themselves rather than spelling them out.