Suit: Unfounded #MeToo claims cost filmmaker

When the Atlanta Film Festival announced the 2018 feature fi film screenplay competition winners in early March, Samuel Good win was thrilled to be among them. His work was one of three chosen from more than 1,000 submissions, earning him free access to the festival and the Screen Craft Writers Summit, in addition to “once ina lifetime one-onone mentorship opportunities,” as a news release said at the time.

But Good win’s honor was rescinded, court documents say, after a “disgruntled former girlfriend” came forward with unspecifified allegations. The lawsuit filed last week in Fulton County Superior Court bills thematter as #MeToo gone awry.

“Despite the fact that he has never committed any #Me Too-type of ff ff ff ff ff fens es ,” the lawsuit says, the fifilm festival sent Goodwin an email that “informed him that it was ‘revoking (his) status as a winner and all prizes associated.’”

“AFF breached their contract with (Goodwin), withdrew a publicly announced prestigious award and badly damaged a young artist’s career without bothering to do a rudimentary investigation and without determining whether unstated allegations made about him were true or had any supporting evidence at all,” the lawsuit says. “(Goodwin) was never given any opportunity to defend himself.”

Atlanta Film Festival offifficial shad no comment regarding the lawsuit. The event, held annually for more than 40years, draws huge crowds and prominent guests. Artists including James Franco, Abigail Spencer, Wendell Pierce, Jason Reitman and Michael Hooker have appeared during past sessions and red carpets. This year’s festival featured the Atlanta premiere of “Maynard,” the documentary about late Atlanta Mayor Maynard Jackson.

Attorney Randolph A. Mayer is representing Goodwin ,25, who graduated in 2014 from Florida State University’s acclaimed fifilm school.

“Movements always go too far,” Mayer said. “Garrison Keillor would be an example. The allegations about him seemed so flflimsy and yet hewas erased as if hewas in a Communist country.”

Keillor’s fall from public-radio prominence followed other high-profile professional collapses including that of disgraced filmogul Harvey Weinstein. In May, a New York grand jury returned indictments on rape, criminal sex act, sex abuse and sexual misconduct charges. He pleaded not guilty.

The legal action against Weinstein followed public accusations by numerous women, first reported by The NewYork Times in October 2017.

Keillor was dismissed by Minnesota Public Radio in November 2017 a mi dun specified complaints.