Weinstein saga another tale in Hollywood’s dark past
Show me a Tinsel Town mogul or powerful producer or tyrannical director and I will show you a man who abused his authority for sexual gratification.
What does the whole, sorry saga of Harvey Weinstein teach us?
Coverage of the case has tended to focus on contemporary events and those of the recent past, the mogul’s own behaviour initially under the spotlight.
A second wave of publicity has seen an expansion of this anger, incorporating attacks on other powerful, established men in the film business.
Whether it be Ben Affleck, whose efforts to propel himself onto the I-hate-harvey bandwagon quickly backfired, or director Oliver Stone, whose pleas for due process have seen him labelled a Weinstein apologist, just about anyone who has expressed an opinion on the scandal has become fair game.
Even Dr Mayim Bialik, the Big Bang Theory actress who wrote the most thoughtful piece yet on the industry from an insider, feminist perspective, had her words twisted and wilfully misunderstood, suggesting that any kind of intellectual approach to the issue threatens to get one branded a ‘‘victim blamer’’.
This hysteria has extended to our own shores. After favouring the Twittersphere with his views on Weinstein, Sean Plunket fell on his own sword at the New Zealand Broadcasting Standards Authority. The pressured resignation said a lot more about authority than it did standards, particularly democratic ones.
You would think Plunket would have first had to stand tall before a senate committee and answer a question like ‘‘are you now or have you ever been a fan of Harvey Weinstein?’’ He isn’t, of course, but the mob wasn’t much interested in the finer points.
The truth is that Harvey Weinsteins have always existed in Hollywood. To a large extent they built the place. Show me a Tinsel Town mogul or powerful producer or tyrannical director and I will show you a man who abused his authority for sexual gratification.
MGM’S Louis B. Mayer pawed the teenage Judy Garland at every opportunity and took actress Ann Miller his mistress. Arthur Freed, the legendary musical producer, exposed himself to Shirley Temple. Columbia’s Harry Cohn made the lives of Rita Hayworth and Kim Novak hell; the price he extracted from Ava Gardner for her thenhusband Frank Sinatra’s casting in From Here to Eternity was a night in the sack.
Director Otto Preminger, a prototypical Weinstein if ever there was one, spent a career bullying and abusing and made a tragic lover out of the vulnerable Dorothy Dandridge. Alfred Hitchcock, after years of fantasising about actresses, crossed the line during the production of Marnie and openly propositioned Tippi Hedren.
Such an overview just scratches the surface. It might also be noted that the grandfather of Ronan Farrow, the journalist whose story initiated the Weinstein scandal, was among the worst offenders of Hollywood’s Golden Age.
Australian born director John Farrow, a notorious womaniser, also imposed himself on Ava Gardner during her marriage to Frank Sinatra. Sinatra’s ultimate revenge was to later marry John’s daughter Mia.
These days Mia likes to pretend that Ronan was actually sired by Sinatra rather than ex-partner Woody Allen. Neither man would have an entirely clean conscience where young ladies are concerned.
If Hollywood were to truly face the power issues and systematic abuse which the Weinstein case raises - not least of which is the conspiracy of silence which has always enabled predators - it would require a complete rewriting of its own history.
It’s all very well to toss Harvey out of the Academy but who founded the Academy in the first place? Louis B Mayer.
As sad and revolting as it is, Harvey Weinstein is the logical extension and contemporary expression of Mayer. Making him a scapegoat does not solve the problem, it gives the false impression that he is exception, not rule.
That said, there’s something about the Weinstein hysteria that brings to mind another dark chapter in Hollywood history, one in which Mayer was also very much a player.
If folk are to be tried and convicted on accusation and innuendo alone we are back to the bad old days of the blacklist. At present, to express the wrong type of opinions about Weinstein is to endanger your career. It’s the equivalent of being a communist sympathiser in the late 1940s or 1950s.
Just as every victim should be accorded respect and empathy, those accused deserve their day in court. If these sentiments have in someway ceased to be relevant in Weinstein’s case, given his own admission of guilt, they should always apply in every other.
To argue differently is to give yourself over to the logic of the witch hunt.