This book is about women who spoke out, those who chose not to, and the nuances of those who did and why. This book is about the story of the men and women who knew about Harvey Weinstein's behavior, those who lived it, and those who just chose to look away. But it's not just about Harvey, it's about powerful men like him who think they can get away with the ill-treatment of women.
Harvey Weinstein was a very powerful man in Hollywood. He was head of Miramax productions and head of The Weinstein Company. Men like him; Roger Ailes, Bill O'Reilly, and Donald Trump are more famous for being serial harassers and assaulters than they are for being businessmen. This is the story of the article that led to the downfall of Harvey Weinstein.
It all started with a phone call to Rose McGowan who had said in an interview weeks earlier that she had been assaulted by a producer early on in her career in Hollywood. It was quite an open secret in Hollywood the way that Harvey treated women. The phone call had led to nothing. it wasn't until Jodi sent a persuasive email to Rose that she had agreed to talk, but there wasn't enough substantial evidence to prove that Harvey had actually assaulted Rose, were the Journalist at a dead end?
Ashley Judd was one of the first actresses with whom the journalist had spoken to but it was also the same, there was no concrete evidence, After a series of interviews with women they got information and tips that Harvey assaulted, the result was the same; there was either no proof or they had reached an agreement with Harvey and his lawyers, and there would be both financial and legal repercussions of they said anything about the incident.
Why go to such great lengths to pretend as if something didn't happen it wasn't going to have dire consequences if word got out about it. The journalist flew to London to meet with Laura Madden a former assistant who worked for Harvey at his London office, she never reached any settlement with Harvey so there was nothing stopping her from going on the record and accusing Harvey of sexual assault, but there was one condition, she couldn't do it alone more women had to come out as well, so she wouldn't have to deal with the backlash by herself.
The reporters were faced with another challenge. During a meeting with their boss to inform him of their progress on the Weinstein story, he informed them that all their meetings and discussion with Harvey had to be on the record. As if all this was not enough, they also had to deal with Gloria Allred and Lisa Bloom, the mother-daughter duo claim to be feminist and defendants of women, but their actions spoke otherwise, and it didn't help that they were both celebrated lawyers with a long list of high profile clients which included Harvey Weinstein.
All the journalists had was a story that was not publishable, victims that were not willing to go on the record - except for Laura but even she had her conditions and unsubstantiated evidence. They got in contact with Irwin Reiter who worked for Miramax and eventually for Weinstein's brother's own movie company. He was the vice president of the accounting department and was sick and tired of his bosses' (Harvey's) predatory behavior towards women and he wanted to talk.
Harvey Weinstein was a sadistic man, intoxicated with power and fame. He felt he was invincible with his money and his high powered attorneys. It got to a point where employees and executives at his company couldn't just look away anymore. This included Irwin Reiter, Bob Weinstein, and Lance Maerov, who all warned Harvey and tried to stop him.
A breakthrough for the journalists came when they got hold of a memo written by Lauren O'Connor, a former employee of Weinstein's Production, detailing assaults of women in the company. Lauren couldn't say anything to the reporters, because she had settled with Harvey but her memo could be used in the article. Now the journalists had something tangible to write about.
A few days before the article would be published the reporters received good news from some of their sources. And the victims of Harvey were willing to go on the record and be named in the article. Despite all the efforts made by Harvey to stop the article, he was not successful the article was published and it caused quite an uproar, more victims came out and it catapulted the #MeToo movement to new heights.
Then another story broke out. A woman was accusing supreme court judge nominee Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault. Her name was Christine Blassey Ford and after a lot of deliberation, and strategizing with her lawyers; Debra Katz and Lisa Banks she was willing to testify in Congress. Even after her testimony where she told her story, nothing changed. Brett Kavanaugh was still nominated to the Supreme Court.
A year after the first article about Harvey Weinstein was published and 3 months after Christine Blassey Ford testified at Capitol Hill, the journalists conducted a joint interview with all the women involved, it included the women who spoke out, the ones who didn't, and the ones who encouraged them to speak out, fought for and believed in them.
The interview was somewhat of a follow-up interview, to ask them how their lives had changed since the article was published. How it changed their lives? Did they think times have changed? Also, what made them come forward with their stories? These women all from different countries, different walks of life, bound together by one thing. They had been treated like they didn't matter, but they fought back, it didn't matter how long it took them to, but they did and they emerged stronger.
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