6 Things Gaslit Fans May Not Know About the Building Where the Watergate Scandal Happened

Even while watching Gaslit, those of us born after a certain year may not fully realize that before the 1972 Watergate scandal, not every controversy was labeled with the “gate” suffix. Without Richard Nixon’s original sin, we would have never had “donutgate” (when Ariana Grande was caught by a security camera licking a tray of pastries in a donut shop), “deflategate” (when the New England Patriots were accused of deflating footballs during a 2015 championship game), and everything in between.

The miniseries (on Starz) chronicles the events that led to articles of impeachment being brought against Nixon and to his eventual resignation, which was seen in the season finale on June 12. Julia Roberts stars as Watergate whistleblower Martha Mitchell, and an unrecognizable Sean Penn plays her husband John Mitchell, Nixon’s former attorney general and the head of his 1972 reelection campaign.

Obviously, the scandal has left quite a political and linguistic legacy, but those unfamiliar with the saga may also not realize that it all started with a building development that has an important architectural legacy of its own. The scandal was named for the 10-acre complex in the Foggy Bottom neighborhood of Washington, D.C., where five men were caught breaking and entering at the office of the Democratic National Committee with the goal of planting listening devices and stealing information on Nixon’s behalf. The 50th anniversary of the break-in is on June 17.

Gaslit tells the tale with a new lens by focusing on the characters. The show explores the Mitchells’ complicated marriage, White House counsel John Dean’s (Dan Stevens) budding romance with a flight attendant named Mo (Betty Gilpin), and how Watergate building security guard Frank Wills (Patrick Walker) coped with life in the spotlight after calling the police during the break-in and becoming a pseudo-celebrity.

Production designer Daniel Novotny, set decorator Jennifer Lukehart, and assistant set decorator Jill Carvalho recreated the six-building Watergate complex for the show on a soundstage at Universal Studios in Los Angeles, but the show is not heavy-handed in spelling out the geography of it all. “The director chose to not get into that too much because it just takes too much explanation,” Novotny tells AD.

Given the fact that the architectural importance of Watergate is so often overshadowed, we thought we’d compile some design-focused facts about the place where the infamous scandal went down. Below are five things the show doesn’t reveal about the real-life Watergate complex.

It was the first mixed-use development in the District of Columbia