So it seems we’ve been cheated on. Duped. Deceived. Whatever term you want to use, we’ve been lied to. And boy, did we fall for it.
The movies, the roles, which we for so long identified as part of the men, were, in fact just jobs.
It was paid employment for them. They were never those characters. They spoke scripted lines, and acted scenes under direction.
I’ll admit that this rationale is a little challenging to apply to The Cosby Show, because the comedian’s name is in the title. But remember, the show was successful and culturally important for reasons beyond Bill Cosby; its legacy of being the first show that positively portrayed a successful black family remains as a beacon for many black Americans. That was the take away at the time, and that doesn’t need to change.
“The greatest trick the devil ever played was convincing the world he didn’t exist.”
Further evidence that movies are more about the overall project than they are about an actor is director Ridley Scott’s latest announcement; that Kevin Spacey is being cut from All the Money in the World, a film about oil magnate J. Paul Getty, and replaced by Christopher Plummer, just over a month before its release. Obviously, the stakes are now too high to risk the time, effort and money that hundreds of people put in just to have the film ruined by Spacey’s presence. And we know that Netflix has done the same with House of Cards.
It’s clear by the world’s reaction that the era of blind celebrity adoration is officially over. And as we weekly hear fresh allegations of abuse of power, we realise we’ve reached the era of accountability. Judgement Day has finally arrived in Hollywood, and we have the brave people who told their stories after years of silence, to thank for that.
Top Comments
I find it hard to believe that people haven't realised Hollywood/the entertainment industry has been like this for a long time and I would imagine most in the industry know; it has just been tolerated in order to make money and fame. Why kill the golden goose! We the consumers feed the industry through our insatiable and blind greed to be entertained. We are numb to the need to challenge the status quo, until something tips the balance. Those reported so far are just the tip of the iceberg and it will involve women too, despite protestations in another story on this site that women are incapable of power-driven abuse. "The greatest trick the devil ever played was convincing the world he didn’t exist.”
You know what I think people find so confronting about this? That people can be multi-faceted. I think the public prefer to think of sexual offenders as unidimensional monsters. It's far harder to reconcile the idea of someone being terribly flawed, a committer of awful deeds, but incredibly talented and gifted in other aspects of their life. Just look at this article: you want to hose down and minimise the professional achievements of these men, attribute their success to others, rather than face up to it: they (allegedly) did reprehensible things, but they are also supremely accomplished and much more than a cookie-cutter stereotype of what we think villains should be.