Striking a worldwide chord
She is an American actor, singer, model, and an activist whose words brought about one of the largest house-cleaning operations against sexual harassment the entertainment industry has ever seen.
But before Rose McGowan became the unlikely face of the worldwide protest against powerful men who abused their positions -like the disgraced Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein -- McGowan made a career out of playing uncompromising women in films.
She began her career with an Independent Spirit Award nomination for her performance as a troubled teen who falls for a violent drifter in provocateur Gregg Araki’s The Doom Generation (1995). McGowan drew from her personal experiences of living as a wayward teen in the 1980s. After years of being told what to say – more importantly, what not to say – and after years of playing outspoken women on screen, McGowan found her voice off it.
A few years after starring in what is arguably her biggest role – the lead in directors Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez’s Grindhouse double feature – McGowan was a part of a New York Times expose against producer of Grindhouse, Harvey Weinstein. Word of her settlement for an unspecified altercation in 1997 was an open secret. Two decades later, her bravery inspired hundreds of women to come forward, and bring an unprecedented change in an industry ruled by men.