Hollywood Elite Have 2nd Thoughts on Weinstein

[Prosay]

That was fast....!

It won't be long now before this perv is welcomed back with opened arms (along with the other miscreants) by these hypocritical SOBs, with the chant of "Harvey: Come Back! We Need You!  All is Forgiven!"

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pagesix.com
Academy members now regret banning Weinstein so hastily
By Merle Ginsberg
6-8 minutes

When Hollywood’s most prestigious organization, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) — the group of nearly 7,000 actors, directors and other industry types who dole out the Oscars — expelled Harvey Weinstein on Oct. 14, audiences applauded. But by acting so swiftly, a mere nine days after the New York Times first reported allegations of sexual assault against the movie producer, the outfit now finds itself facing a dilemma.

Put simply: What to do with the rest of them?

“Harvey opened the floodgates,” said one male Academy member. “Now the Academy’s drowning in a tide of s—t. They don’t know what hit them.”

What hit, of course, were more alleged horror stories about so many other members: Kevin Spacey assaulting multiple young men, Dustin Hoffman sticking his hands in women’s pants, director Brett Ratner forcing himself on actresses. Ben Affleck seen on video groping a female host on “Total Request Live.” Screenwriter James Toback accused of sexual misdeeds by nearly 40 women. (As of this past Tuesday, the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office said it is considering criminal charges in five cases against Toback. He, Spacey, Hoffman and Ratner, deny the claims against them.)

“[We] can’t regret [kicking out Harvey] because [we] didn’t really have a choice,” said one male member of AMPAS’ board of governors. “Some members were quite vehement. But [we] didn’t have time to really weigh out the repercussions.”

The emergency meeting to deal with Weinstein was conducted by the 54-member board of governors — which includes Steven Spielberg, Tom Hanks, Whoopi Goldberg and Laura Dern — after it received a Change.org petition with 100,000 signatures calling for his ouster.

“But they didn’t give themselves time to plot out how to deal with this going forward,” said one prominent female AMPAS member. “Kathleen Kennedy [producer of the ‘Star Wars’ series] and some other female governors panicked and felt compelled to act. They thought [Weinstein] could hurt AMPAS’ cred. Some of them did admit this was a slippery slope. But I don’t think they imagined how slippery. It’s definitely caused some problems and fights among the board members.”
 

And it’s not just new allegations that are haunting the Academy. What to do about two of the most notorious accused sexual predators in Hollywood, Bill Cosby and Roman Polanski, who were charged years before the Weinstein stories broke? Or, for that matter, Casey Affleck — who last year won the Best Actor Oscar — and the two settled cases of sexual-harassment against him? (Cosby and Affleck deny the accusations.)

Now, a barrage of petitions, complaints and letters are hitting Academy CEO Dawn Hudson and newly elected president John Bailey about these other men.

Hudson had no comment, but her office reissued her original statement on the matter, which read in part:  "A task force will finalize procedures for handling allegations of misconduct, assuring that we can address them fairly and expeditiously. This process will ultimately guide the board of governors in assessing if certain allegations warrant action regarding membership. Those procedures will be sent to you in the new year.”

Mused another AMPAS member, “Dawn may not know what they’re going to do next. That’s why the statement’s so vague. The board says they’re going to take action, but what action? It will have to be case by case. They must revisit and reinvent the rules of membership — and it’s gonna get nasty.”

To join AMPAS, you must work in the production of theatrically-released films and be recommended by two members — unless you are already an Academy Award nominee, in which case you are automatically considered for inclusion.

Before Weinstein, there had only been one example of revoked membership: “Godfather” actor Carmine Caridi in 2004, who’d loaned out Academy screeners that wound up being sold.)

Indie filmmaker Cameron Bossert filed a petition to the Academy in early November, asking it to bar Casey Affleck from presenting this year’s Best Actress trophy, as is the tradition with the reigning Best Actor.

“I just wanted to help hold the Academy responsible for their really broad statement, that ‘the era of willful ignorance and shameful complicity in workplace harassment is over,’ ” Bossert told us. “My petition wasn’t the best way of doing this, since the Affleck case was settled out of court already. But the Academy said they were taking it into consideration, and I stopped the petition at 20,000 signatures.”

Edward Lozzi, a veteran publicist who represents two of the more than 50 women who claim abuse by Bill Cosby, has written a letter to the Academy and asked AMPAS mem bers to do the same, as he simultaneously wages a social-media campaign calling for Cosby’s ouster.

“I asked. . . why people like that are still in when you’re sacking others? Most of the public doesn’t even know who Harvey Weinstein is. There’s been no response to my letter,” he said. “It would be nice for [the] Academy to let us know they are not totally apathetic.”

Meanwhile, Marianne Barnard, a Santa Barbara, Calif., artist who’s the fifth woman to claim Polanski sexually assaulted her when she was underage, launched a Care2 petition on Oct. 18, demanding the Academy eject him. So far, no response.

Some Academy members are fed up with the feet-dragging.

“None of [us] really know what the governors are thinking on this subject. They rarely tell us anything until they’ve decided. Then we have to read it in the trades or get a curt e-mail from Dawn, usually after it appears in the press. All we can do is roll our eyes,” said one longtime member. “I’m in favor of taking a very measured approach and not a knee-jerk reaction.”

Variety co-Editor-in-Chief Claudia Eller asked Hudson on Nov. 1 if the organization was “giving any thought” to the Casey Affleck situation. Hudson replied, “Yes, we are. Of course we are. We’re giving thought to all of this.”

But insiders say thinking about it isn’t enough.

“They keep saying that,” said another female member. “But, right now, it’s easier to get someone an Academy Award than to get them expelled from the Academy.”

[Prosay]

nypost.com
The post-Weinstein Golden Globes was an exercise in hypocrisy
Maureen Callahan
5-7 minutes

And the award for ultimate hypocrisy goes to . . . the Hollywood class of 2018.

This year’s Golden Globes were meant to be a defiant, vibrant celebration of a post-Weinstein industry, an awards ceremony about so much more than meaningless awards. We were promised a reckoning, the leveling of a male-dominated industry that institutionalized the rape, abuse and harassment of women for decades.

Like so much Hollywood product, advance buzz was greatly exaggerated. Not one actor or actress, on the red carpet or on stage, made direct reference to their industry’s greatest monster — the one they boast of slaying yet still want to appease.

Host Seth Meyers, in his opening monologue, was the only person in the room to mention him by name.

“Harvey Weinstein can’t be here tonight because, well, I’ve heard rumors that he’s crazy and difficult to work with,” Meyers said. “But don’t worry — he’ll be back in 20 years when he becomes the first person ever booed during the ‘In Memoriam’ segment.”

And how did these brave, crusading, black-garbed, pin-wearing celebrities respond? They booed.

Same when Meyers made a crack about the disgraced Kevin Spacey fumbling a Southern accent. “Oh, is that too mean?” Meyers asked incredulously. “To Kevin Spacey?”

Even a tame Woody Allen joke fell flat. It seems there’s no sexual predator who still doesn’t get Hollywood’s sympathy.

Yet many of the night’s honorees spoke like leaders of a revolution.

“May we teach our children that speaking out without fear of retribution is our culture’s new North Star,” said Laura Dern. She, like several other stars, brought along other female activists, apparently to remind us that Hollywood’s not the only cesspool.

Dern brought Monica Ramirez, of the National Farmworker Women’s Alliance, and reminded us that Ramirez’s group would be feeding the Globes attendees. (Not literally, but still.)

Emma Stone brought Billie Jean King — which made sense, as Stone played the tennis legend in “Battle of the Sexes” — yet NBC misspelled King’s first name while referring to her as the “O.G.” of gender equality.

Michelle Williams brought Tarana Burke, founder of the #MeToo movement, and Williams gave nearly identical speeches to E! and NBC. “I thought I would have to raise my daughter to learn how to protect herself in a dangerous world,” she said. “And I think because of the work that I’m learning how to do we actually have the opportunity to hand our children a different world. So I am like moved beyond measure to be standing next to this woman. I have like, tears in my eyes and a smile on my face.”

Then she made prayer hands.

Why no questions about Spacey, who costarred with Williams in “All the Money in the World” until he was accused of assaulting a teenage boy and was excised from the film? Does Williams have any thoughts on her director Ridley Scott’s recent statement that he never thought twice about hiring Spacey, even though he heard rumors? Or that it wasn’t his decision, but the studio’s, to replace him with Christopher Plummer? How about Scott’s assertion that Harvey Weinstein may mount a comeback, and that perhaps we should forgive?

Not relevant, apparently. Or maybe it would make Williams — God forbid — uncomfortable.

How about Meryl Streep showing up with Ai-Jen Poo, the little-known director of the National Domestic Worker’s Alliance? Streep has vocally denied knowing anything about Weinstein — who she famously called “God” at the 2012 Globes — but instead preferred to talk in vague platitudes.

“I think that people are aware now of a power imbalance . . . and it’s led to abuse . . . and we want to fix that,” she told Ryan Seacrest.

What a profile in courage.

Meanwhile, not one presenting or accepting actress mentioned Rose McGowan, who kickstarted this entire movement and who says she was raped by Harvey Weinstein. Sitting together up front were Ashley Judd and Salma Hayek, who both went public with the abuse and torment Weinstein visited upon them; in the New York Times, Hayek wrote that Weinstein threatened to have her killed.

These women are heroes. Not one of their colleagues called them out, thanked them, or acknowledged their bravery.

In perhaps the night’s most twisted hosanna, 101-year-old Kirk Douglas was honored with a standing ovation and special award. It didn’t take long for Twitter to light up over Douglas’s long-rumored rape of Natalie Wood when she was just 16.

If the average viewer at home knows about this, how could a room of insiders not? Just what are they trying to say?

Towards the end of the night, supporting actress winner Allison Janney — who won for playing Tonya Harding’s mother in “I, Tonya” — thanked the actual Harding, an invited guest, for “sharing her story . . . a story about truth and the perception of truth in the media.”

Harding, of course, was a real-life perpetrator of female-on-female crime, having her Olympic rival Nancy Kerrigan kneecapped — and though the movie exonerates her, Harding has admitted to at least having knowledge of a plot. Kerrigan later said the FBI told her they believed Harding was the mastermind and showed her transcripts detailing a plot to have her killed.

“That was one of the options,” Kerrigan said. “To kill me over a sporting event. That’s crazy.”

But in Hollywood’s version, Tonya’s a feminist hero. What a metaphor.