Costly moral of the story

IT WAS, the studio executives must have conceded, a costly mistake.

Kevin Spacey was lined up to star in the sixth and final season of

House of Cards, Netflix’s blockbuster political drama but when Anthony Rapp accused Spacey in October of making a frightening sexual advance towards him in 1986 when he was 14, Netflix knew they could not go ahead. Spacey was dropped from House

of Cards and a forthcoming Gore Vidal film, shot for Netflix over the summer, was canned. Because he did not have a “morality clause” in his contract, however, Spacey was paid for both and the debacle reportedly cost Netflix $39-million (R468-million).

Since Harvey Weinstein’s spectacular fall from grace in September, precipitated by allegations of rape – which he denies – from the actress Rose McGowan, the floodgates have opened and a roll call of Hollywood studio executives and actors have found themselves out of work, their projects on hold.

The financial damage inflicted on the industry is so great that many studios are now beginning to insist on “morality clauses” – contractual agreements that mean a person could be dismissed without pay if they misbehave.

“If I’m a studio, I want the biggest, broadest morality clause I can get,” said Ed McPherson, founder of law firm McPherson Rane and a specialist in entertainment law.

“But as an artist, I’m worried – what infraction falls into this? It’s easy to say it applies in a Weinstein scenario. But some clauses mention the behaviour that would ‘shock, insult or offend the community or public morals’. What does that mean?”

Morality clauses are not new. They were first used in 1921, when the public backlash against Paramount following the arrest of Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle on rape and murder charges drove Universal Studios, one of Paramount’s competitors, to insert clauses insisting on good behaviour in their contracts. —