(screams from the crowd) (narrator) in 1968, haskell wexler used the riots surrounding the democratic national convention in chicago as a backdrop for a feature film. "medium cool" employed real and fictional elements to explore the impact of tv on the 60's traumatic event. (screams and commotion from the crowd) the title "medium cool" is derived by marshall mcluhan, who spoke of television as being a "cool" medium. (haskell wexler) what was happening was happening in the street and there were other cameras shooting. i had a camera where my actress was involved in the situation. (crowd chanting) people in the streets recognize that their validity would not be certified unless it was on television. when it was on tv it existed, because if tv ignores you, if tv does not present you to the people, then it does not exist in our world of image control. (narrator) in 1976, sidney lumet and paddy chayevsky examined the colliding worlds of fiction and documentary tv. the result was the darkly comic film, "network." i would like at this moment to announce that i will be retiring from this prog