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Betty MacDonald, the author of The Egg and I and the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle Series is beloved all over the world. Don't miss Wolfgang Hampel's Betty MacDonald biography and his very witty interviews on CD and DVD!
Saturday, December 9, 2017
Bryan Singer joins Kevin Spacey
Bryan Singer joins Kevin Spacey and the rest of sleazy Hollywood’s usual suspects
Unwanted men (from left): Bryan Singer, Matt Lauer, Harvey Weinstein, Garrison Keillor and Kevin Spacey.
Composite: Rex/Shutterstock/Guardian Design Team
The film director has been fired from his current Queen biopic, but
as with all the other cases of harassment, bullying and toxic
masculinity, what took Tinseltown so long?
Round
up the usual suspects, the public cried, as Hollywood promised to clean
all the sexual harassers, bullies and general examples of toxic
masculinity out of its closet. This turned out to be even easier than it
sounded because all we needed to do, it transpired, was to round up the
actual Usual Suspects, as in the star and director of The Usual
Suspects, Kevin Spacey and Bryan Singer. Chazz Palminteri, I reckon even you could have solved this one without smashing your coffee cup, given that Gabriel Byrne recently revealed that the production of The Usual Suspects was briefly shut down because of “inappropriate sexual behaviour by Spacey”. The Usual Suspects,
incidentally, was made in 1994, meaning it took – gets out calculator –
23 years before Spacey was finally called out on his widely known
behaviour. Remind me again, guys, how unfair life is for white men these
days? Anyway, if there was one person in Hollywood who was the subject of
more rumours over the past decade than Spacey, that person is Singer.
The late and increasingly lamented Gawker, which dropped large and
largely ignored hints about a lot of the male celebrities now being
revealed as sexual pond scum, went after Singer with a vengeance in its day, accusing him of being a predator and worse. Amy Berg’s 2014 documentary, An Open Secret, about child sex abuse in the film industry, alleged that Singer attended parties held by Marc Collins-Rector,
known for throwing hedonistic parties where underaged boys were in
attendance. Collins-Rector later pled guilty to transporting minors
across state lines for the purpose of sex, but the various lawsuits
filed over the years against Singer alleging child sex abuse were all dismissed. So news from the set of the beleaguered Queen biopic (Queen as in Freddie Mercury, not Elizabeth Windsor, for the record) that Singer had thrown what was described as “an object”
at star Rami Malek sounded, quite frankly, like a relatively wholesome
infraction allegedly committed by the director. Although, to be fair, we
don’t actually know what the object is. Suggestions on a postcard and
then thrown in a septic tank, thanks.
The official story is that Singer was fired
from the Queen biopic on Monday for “unexplained absences”. Singer has
retorted that the problem was that Fox refused to give him time off to
care for “a sick parent”. A third person – a very cynical person, one
whose cynicism has built up around her personage like a hide to protect
her from the endless tales of toxic male garbage fires emerging from
every industry in the world – might counter that chucking Singer is
rather convenient for Fox, given that having a man on your payroll about
whom there have been rumours for literal decades is not such a great
look for a company right now.Whatever the truth, Singer is out and will now have as much time as he wants to care for his sick parent and … Dexter Fletcher is in. That’s right, Spike from Press Gang
is now directing the Queen biopic. I think we all felt a twinge of
sadness that Freddie Mercury is no longer around so we can’t actually
see his facial expression upon hearing that news.
Perhaps you’re thinking: “Whether it’s Dexter Fletcher or
Steven Spielberg” – and I’m pretty sure those were the two options for
the Queen movie before Fox opted for the former – “swapping directors
midway through production doesn’t bode well for this film”, and you
would be right. But rest assured that this film has always sounded
thrillingly bad. Last year, Sacha Baron Cohen appeared on The Howard Stern Show
after he dropped out of the movie (do keep up here) to say that,
actually, he should have dropped out a lot sooner. After the first
meeting, in fact, when a member of Queen told him that Freddie dies in
the middle of the movie. “So I said: ‘Wait a minute. What happens in the
second half of the movie?’ And he said: ‘Well, we see how the band
carries on from strength to strength,’” Baron Cohen recalled. Let us all
take a five-minute pause and savour that sentence again, and then let’s
wish, again, that Freddie were still with us so we could see his
expression at hearing THAT particular quote. “Brian May,” Baron Cohen
concluded, “is an amazing musician, but he’s not a great movie
producer.”
So, really, the fact that one always clearly unsuitable director has
been swapped for Dexter Fletcher is pretty much the least of this
movie’s problems.But let’s get back to Singer, because substituting Fletcher for him
raises an interesting possibility. Perhaps all American celebrities
accused of sexual predation could simply be swapped for unthreatening
British versions thereof: bring on Ant and Dec for Matt Lauer, Hugh Dennis for Spacey, Andrew Castle for Garrison Keillor, et cetera and so forth. Think of it as being like when they remade The Office with attractive Americans, but in reverse. Or, hey, here’s another idea! How about if only women get the big top
jobs for the next, let’s say, 1,000 days? This is for the protection of
employers, really. After all, no woman has been accused of feeling up
subordinates in theatres, or raping people in hotel rooms, or throwing
objects at actors on set. Think of all the money, time and bother
companies would save by not having to deal with endless rape and
harassment allegations! And to all the men out there already furiously
emailing me to insist that it’s sexist to rule out an entire gender for
powerful employment opportunities, I say: welcome to being a woman in
Hollywood for the past hundred years, bitches. Just be grateful Harvey Weinstein isn’t also literally trying to screw you while his industry simultaneously screws you out of jobs. So, in conclusion, another probably awful man has been sacked in
Hollywood. Once, this would have been big news. As it is, we just call
it Monday now.
Betty MacDonald Fan Club, founded by Wolfgang Hampel, has members in 40 countries.
Wolfgang Hampel, author of Betty MacDonald biography interviewed Betty MacDonald's family and friends. His Interviews have been published on CD and DVD by Betty MacDonald Fan Club. If you are interested in the Betty MacDonald Biography or the Betty MacDonald Interviews send us a mail, please.
Several original Interviews with Betty MacDonald are available.
We are also organizing international Betty MacDonald Fan Club Events for example, Betty MacDonald Fan Club Eurovision Song Contest Meetings in Oslo and Düsseldorf, Royal Wedding Betty MacDonald Fan Club Event in Stockholm and Betty MacDonald Fan Club Fifa Worldcup Conferences in South Africa and Germany.
Betty MacDonald Fan Club Honour Members are Monica Sone, author of Nisei Daughter and described as Kimi in Betty MacDonald's The Plague and I, Betty MacDonald's nephew, artist and writer Darsie Beck, Betty MacDonald fans and beloved authors and artists Gwen Grant, Letizia Mancino, Perry Woodfin, Traci Tyne Hilton, Tatjana Geßler, music producer Bernd Kunze, musician Thomas Bödigheimer, translater Mary Holmes and Mr. Tigerli.
