‘It’s a very lonely feeling,’ Munn says
Last week, just weeks before its première at the Toronto International Film Festival, 20th Century Fox cut a scene from director Shane Black’s The Predator featuring a longtime friend of his who, it turned out, happens to be a registered sex offender.
The studio learned the news only after lead actress Olivia Munn, the only member of the cast who shared scenes with the actor, reported to the studio that Steven Wilder Striegel spent time in jail for attempting to seduce a 14-yearold girl online.
But, in a recent interview with Variety, Munn said it was days before Fox took action, meeting her report with complete silence, pushing her to reach out again.
“I’m not saying they weren’t working on it behind the scenes,” Munn said. “I just didn’t hear anything about it. But I’m happy that they did obviously because I’m proud of the work we did in this movie, we all worked really, really hard, and I wouldn’t be able to morally stand behind this movie
with this guy in there.”
Also speaking to Variety, Black said he and Striegel have been friends for more than a decade, and that he simply felt he was “helping a friend.”
Since the news came out, Munn revealed that Black has not spoken to her, while her co-stars have given her and the entire matter a cold shoulder. The actress has been doing the TIFF interview circuit largely alone, most of her male co-stars all backing out.
In an interview with Vanity Fair, Munn said one of her male co-stars even “walked out” in the middle of a joint interview when the subject came up.
She noted on Twitter that she is contractually obligated to continue the press tour, “And from what I’m experiencing, I think they’d prefer I not show up. It would make everyone breathe easier.”
Sterling K. Brown has been the only co-star to address the controversy, tweeting this weekend in a confusing thread, “I’m sorry you’re feeling so isolated, my dear. I so appreciate that you ‘didn’t leave well enough alone,’ and again, I’m sorry you feel isolated in taking action.”
Keegan-Michael Key, meanwhile, had his publicist say in a statement that he “reached out to Olivia privately last week to let her know how proud he was of her.”