#MeToo movement surged atop top-story list
NEW YORK — Arguably the biggest thing that came from Hollywood this year wasn’t a movie or a TV show. It had heroines and villains, but no script. And it went viral despite having no big publicity machinery behind it.
The women who initially spoke out against sexual misconduct in Hollywood this fall — inspiring millions to tell their own stories of harassment and illegality on social media — have been named The Associated Press Entertainers of the Year, voted by members of the news cooperative and AP entertainment reporters.
The wave of sexual misconduct allegations that has stretched across the country and toppled prominent TV figures, chefs, journalists, entertainers, politicians and publishers was also named the top news story of 2017 in an AP poll.
The reckoning began in early October when a bombshell New York Times article revealed decades of sexual harassment against women — employees and actresses, including actress Ashley Judd — by movie mogul Harvey Weinstein. The New Yorker also revealed other allegations against Weinstein.
Within days, a #MeToo movement was born and the allegations have been felt at the venerable “Today” show, with the ouster of Matt Lauer, to the film “All the Money in the World,” from which Kevin Spacey was erased. Comedian Louis C.K. was abandoned by Netflix, FX and HBO, and his new movie was abandoned just days before its premiere.
The accusations reverberated at PBS, where Tavis Smiley and Charlie Rose were dropped. It reached into the venerable New York’s Metropolitan Opera, where longtime conductor James Levine was suspended, and the Def Jam empire, where Russell Simmons stepped down. The allegations also have rattled Congress, with several members resigning or announcing plans not to run again, most notably Sen. Al Franken.
Others who received votes this year for Entertainer of the Year were Jimmy Kimmel, Gal Gadot, Kendrick Lamar and Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee, among others.
Among all stories, the AP poll rated Donald Trump’s tumultuous first year as president as the No. 2 story.
Here are 2017’s top 10 stories, in order:
Scandals involving sexual misdeeds by prominent men are nothing new, but there’s never been anything like the deluge of allegations this year.
The controversies started on Inauguration Day, when the new president was challenged over his claims on the size of the crowd, and persisted throughout.
A 64-year-old highstakes video poker player unleashed a barrage of gunfire from a high-rise casino-hotel, killing 58 people and injuring hundreds. He was killed, and his motives remain unknown.
In a four-week span, Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria ravaged Texas, Florida, Puerto Rico and other Caribbean islands.
The taunts had a schoolyard flavor to them — a “dotard” versus “Little Rocket Man.” But they came from two leaders with nuclear arms at their disposal — Trump and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un.
Robert Mueller was appointed to investigate potential coordination between Russia and Trump’s election campaign. So far, Mueller’s team has brought charges against four people, but who knows when the probe will end and who will be ensnared.
Majority Republicans failed to repeal Barack Obama’s health-care law, but they have chipped away, leaving its future in grave doubt.
Without a single Democratic vote, Republicans in Congress pushed through a sweeping $1.5 trillion tax overhaul that would cut corporate taxes while producing mixed results for individuals.
The first big attack came on New Year’s Day — a gunman killing 39 at a club in Istanbul. Subsequent attacks involved a concert in England, a promenade in Barcelona and a mosque in Egypt, where more than 300 were killed.
An array of forces eventually drove the Islamic State from its two main strongholds — the city of Mosul in Iraq, and its self-styled capital, Raqqa, in Syria. But affiliates elsewhere, particularly in Egypt and Afghanistan, continued to operate.