The checks and balances the Constitution was designed to create functioned when put to their biggest test. Would they still? (Adriana Usero, Danielle Kunitz/The Washington Post)

By Robert Redford March 31

Robert Redford is an actor, director, producer and environmental activist.

In July 1972, I was on a train tour through Florida promoting the film "The Candidate." Entertainment and political press were on board, and I heard them gossiping about a break-in at Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington. The story was being covered by two young reporters from The Washington Post, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein.

The reporters were at the infancy of an investigation that would come to be known as Watergate, the greatest political scandal in modern American history. But at the time it was simply a few small articles about a break-in.

As time went on, I became fascinated with their story. It occurred to me it might make a good film — two hard-working journalists struggling to get to the truth. My first idea was simply to make a movie about two reporters, the importance of journalism and freedom of the press. It was only later that the depth of the Watergate scandal was discovered.