America 1987

Chapter 55 The Gap Between Director and Actor

Unlike Harvey, who was ganged up on for sexual assault, Warren Beatty has a very good reputation among women.

"The first time I saw him in the hotel lobby, he just walked past me, and I was immediately captivated by him." — Diane Keaton

"You can keep your experiences with him as your deepest secret, and you can trust that he will never reveal it." — Goldie Horn

"I was crazy about him; he was a born Casanova." — Michelle Phillips

"He's amazing, he can do this with me and answer the phone at the same time!" — Madonna

Yes, Madonna is Madonna; she can easily put her ahead of her contemporaries with just a single sentence.

"He might actually do it seven times a day, but I just lie there." — Joan Coslin

It's said that this is why the two broke up...

In fact, most of the female celebrities mentioned above had a strong element of exchanging benefits in their relationships with him, which is essentially a form of unspoken rule.

Achieving a near-zero negative review record for after-sales service is nothing short of a miracle.

However, looking at Harvey's beer belly and double chin, and recalling Warren Beatty's face that resembles Tom Cruise and his 188cm height that would make the latter envious, David thinks that to achieve a zero-criticism record, he must have done some modeling work.

After seeing the other person off, David felt he needed to be more careful in the future.

Although he claims to be no worse than the old man in terms of modeling, times are about to change, and he can't completely copy his template.

Weinstein's downfall was largely due to his underestimation of the power and influence of online public opinion.

Back in 2004, The New York Times was prepared to expose Harvey's scandal. However, at that time, the Internet was just emerging and news reporting was still mainly done by traditional media. Therefore, Harvey easily forced the newspaper to retract the article and suppress the matter.

By 2017, self-media had largely matured, and he could no longer suppress it.

An unknown female celebrity's retweet of a Me Too tweet could spark a multi-year-long online feminist movement.

The most negative impact of Weinstein's downfall was that people discovered the immense power of the Internet.

No substantial evidence is needed; simply posting a short, first-person narrative on social media (specifically Weibo) with an emotional tone, focusing on issues such as gender injustice, sexual harassment, and workplace discrimination, can quickly evoke empathy and public support.

No matter how important you are, as long as you mention the words "sexual harassment" in your essays, whether it's true or false, and regardless of whether there's substantial evidence, it can have a devastating impact on your life and career.

Zhu Jun from the East China Sea and Kevin Spacey from Hollywood were both ruined and had their lives destroyed because of these fabricated charges.

The former is in a slightly better situation, while the latter is about to fall below the death line.

In 17, after he was accused of sexual harassment in a long essay, Netflix removed him from the final season of "House of Cards" to avoid trouble, and Hollywood industry insiders also implicitly blacklisted him.

In subsequent legal trials, all criminal and civil charges against him were ruled not guilty.

However, because of this scandal, he has been largely excluded from mainstream film and television projects.

A once-renowned Oscar-winning actor is now forced to live in hotels (his house has been auctioned off to fund his legal battles), burdened with millions of dollars in legal fees, and suffering a sharp decline in income. He can only make ends meet by performing in nightclubs and working on low-budget films.

From this perspective, actors do indeed have a rather insignificant status in the Hollywood industry.

Quentin Tarantino was also embroiled in the sensitive topic of sexual harassment, but he was completely unscathed.

Hollywood actress Uma Thurman's daughter, Maya Hawke, revealed in public that her mother repeatedly advised her to remember to wear shoes when working with Quentin Tarantino, ostensibly accusing him of foot fetishism, but actually implying sexual harassment.

British media reports that, in addition to the "foot fetish" rumors, Quentin Tarantino has also been found to have made physical contact with actresses on multiple occasions during filming.

Why is it that even though there's solid evidence, he's still completely unscathed? Because no one has formally filed a lawsuit against him.

Why hasn't anyone formally sued him? Because directors and actors are simply not in the same league within the Hollywood industry.

Hollywood has drastically different standards of tolerance for "irreplaceable creators" and "replaceable actors." Netflix can continue making "House of Cards" without Kevin Spacey; but without Quentin Tarantino, there would be no projects like "Kill Bill" or "Inglourious Basterds."

Investors, actors, and distribution channels all revolve around him; the chain of interests runs too deep. Criticizing him is fine, but boycotting him means boycotting an entire industry chain—the actors he works with, production companies, distributors, and cinema chains.

The cost is too high, so the industry chooses to remain silent, which is the so-called industry role protection effect.

No matter how big an actor is, they are still essentially "employees." When Spacey was replaced in "House of Cards," Netflix brought in Christopher Plummer for reshoots, and viewers criticized it a bit but accepted it. The series continued to air, and the platform continued to make money.

Cutting off an actor only costs you to reshoot a few scenes and change a few posters; cutting off a director costs you the death of the entire project, the loss of tens of millions of dollars, and the unemployment of the entire team.

When making decisions, the production company considers economic factors, not moral ones. Quentin Tarantino's position gives him built-in "bulletproof vests," while Spacey's doesn't.

To illustrate with a more extreme example—Woody Allen, accused of sexual assault by his adopted daughter, is still making films; Roman Polanski, after admitting to having relationships with minors, fled to France and remains a regular at European film festivals. They are both directors, both "core members of their projects."

Conversely, even actors of Johnny Depp's caliber were replaced in "Pirates of the Caribbean" without Disney batting an eye. This is because the role of "Captain Jack Sparrow" is more valuable than Depp himself; replacing him with someone else would still get audiences buying tickets.

Therefore, when David was reading entertainment novels before he transmigrated, he would usually only look for novels where the protagonist was a director. From the perspective of the underlying logic of reality, the entertainment value of actor novels was far less than that of director novels.

For example, right now, David feels very comfortable.

"How is it? How does it feel?"

With a smile, David gently stroked Nicole's scalp, which was wet with water.

When I first applied the shampoo, the foam was smooth and easy to apply with my fingertips, and I could clearly feel the texture of my scalp.

This is because healthy people have a layer of fine, soft stubble on their scalp, and their fingertips can feel the roots of the hair standing up and feeling a little prickly.

"Mmm, it feels very comfortable."

Feeling drowsy and disoriented, Nicole didn't open her eyes and answered the other person with a nasal tone.

The scalp has a dense network of nerves, and rubbing it can produce a tingling, electric-like sensation that spreads from the head and neck to the back of the neck. Therefore, rhythmic rubbing can easily cause a loss of focus and induce drowsiness.