| | | | | Good evening from the Murrow Awards in NYC... Scroll down for some of the highlights... But first, a Shakespearean twist to the Harvey Weinstein scandal... | | This is what Harvey Weinstein is thinking | | Harvey Weinstein suspects that his brother Bob Weinstein betrayed him. The longstanding tensions between the brothers have reached a breaking point, and they've barely spoken at all since the NYT story came out last Thursday. Harvey is telling confidants that this is Bob's fault. "Harvey is convinced that this was a takedown," a longtime friend of Weinstein's told me Monday. "He feels betrayed by his brother."
This account was confirmed by two other sources. But it strikes some onlookers as nothing more than an excuse by Weinstein -- a convenient alternative to the prevailing view that decades of improper behavior has finally caught up to him. Here's my full story...
-- A spokesman for Bob told me he declined to comment. A spokesman for Harvey did not respond to multiple requests for comment...
-- Credit where it's due: Page Six first alluded to this possibility in an item last week, before Weinstein was fired. "It's Cain and Abel -- Hollywood style," the gossip column said... | | | Harvey was uncharacteristically quiet on Monday. He hasn't commented since Sunday night's firing... no statement, nothing. But some people at TWC are bracing, knowing he's not likely to stay quiet for long... | | Have any ideas for the company's new name? | | | TheWrap, the WSJ and other outlets are reporting that Weinstein Co. may change its name. "The studio has enlisted two ad agencies to develop a new brand identity," the WSJ said Monday night, citing a person close to the company. "In addition, Harvey Weinstein's name is being scrubbed from the credits" of upcoming film and TV projects... | | -- Same as last night: Who knew what, when?
-- What's going to happen when employees come back to work at Weinstein Co. on Tuesday? Many employees had the day off on Monday...
-- What's on the agenda at the next board meeting? Per the WSJ, "Weinstein Co.'s board is scheduled to meet Wednesday" to decide whether Bob Weinstein and David Glasser "should be named to run the company permanently..."
-- When will Ronan Farrow's Weinstein investigation for The New Yorker come out? Some people thought it would hit on Monday...
-- Late night hosts were weirdly silent about the scandal when it broke on Thursday. Will there be lots of jokes at Weinstein's expense on Monday night? | | Rose McGowan's message to the board | | | Rose McGowan tweeted a message to the remaining board members on Monday afternoon: "Bob Weinstein, Lance Maerov, Richard Koenigsberg and Tarak Ben Ammar, David Glasser: you knew. you funded. you are guilty. #resign" | | -- Check out NYT exec editor Dean Baquet's answers to questions about earlier Weinstein reporting...
-- There's lots of gossiping going on about Weinstein's wife Georgina Chapman. People mag says the couple are "together at a hotel in Los Angeles..." | | -- Meryl Streep, Julianne Moore, Patricia Arquette, Susan Sarandon, and other Hollywood stars spoke out on Monday. Lisa Respers France has the quotes here...
-- VF's Rebecca Keegan reacted in her (excellent!) daily newsletter: "Well, a sexual harassment scandal may not prevent you from getting elected president, but it will kill your chances of making a new Meryl Streep movie..."
-- Seconding what Jessica Chastain tweeted: "I'm sick of the media demanding only women speak up. What about the men? Perhaps many are afraid to look at their own behavior..."
-- Lena Dunham's NYT op-ed: "The Silence of the Men..."
-- Amanda Katz tweeted: "Puzzled by people's apparent shock that powerful predatory men generally face few consequences. Did I dream the Access Hollywood tape?"
-- BTW: The chair of the RNC says the allegations about Weinstein and President Trump are "not even comparable..." 🤔 | | Masters says some men are "pretty nervous right now" | | Megan Thomas emails: Kim Masters, editor-at-large for THR, wrote this worthy piece on how to cure Hollywood's "sickness" of harassment.
"No doubt some people are asking themselves now what they could or should have done differently over the years of Harvey's reign. And I am quite sure that some men in the business, aware of their own bad conduct, are pretty nervous right now. But will anything really change? Maybe. The studios belong to big companies now and the corporate parents are less likely to tolerate bad behavior. Still, I suspect that some at the peak of power still feel invincible. Until women are properly represented in front of and behind the cameras and in executive offices -- and the statistics are grim -- Hollywood won't truly cure itself of this particular sickness." | | ICYMI: Weinstein's desperate Sunday email | | | This is remarkable. Janice Min published it via Twitter Monday afternoon. It's the email Weinstein sent to several media industry CEOs and agents prior to being fired on Sunday. "My board is thinking of firing me," he wrote... "We believe what the board is trying to do is not only wrong but might be illegal and would destroy the company..." So he asked his friends to write a letter supporting him. "I am desperate for your help," he wrote. "Just give me the time to have therapy. Do not let me be fired. If the industry supports me, that is all I need." | | "Harvey Weinstein Is Finished. Which Accused Hollywood Predator Will Be Next?" | | Brian Lowry emails: Regarding the "everybody knew" debate, which is likely to play out for some time, it's possible at least some people heard stories about Weinstein being a jerk, or worse, without knowing enough details to feel compelled to shun him in a business with no shortage of them. In Weinstein's case, there was talk of him employing someone whose primary role was to procure escorts at festivals -- a story Sharon Waxman discussed in her piece accusing the New York Times of self-righteousness -- that fell into the realm of revolting, but not necessarily predatory, behavior. The extent to which celebrities didn't want to know more, of course, is another matter...
-- Lowry adds: A thornier question, yet to be vetted, involves the money Weinstein poured into Oscar campaigns. To what extent might that $$$$ have been leveraged to make media outlets think twice about pursuing various rumors? | | Frank Pallotta emails: "Strike two" on Twitter led to a two-week suspension for Jemele Hill. ESPN announced the controversial move on Monday afternoon. ICYMI: Hill reacted on Twitter to statements from Cowboys owner Jerry Jones by saying that if you reject what Jones said about protests during the national anthem then "the key is his advertisers." While she tweeted that she wasn't advocating for an NFL boycott, ESPN execs were furious...
--> Deadspin's reaction: "Here's where ESPN the broadcast partner overpowers ESPN the newsgathering organization..."
-- Richard Deitsch is always a must-read on days like this... | | Michael Smith sits out "SC6" | | | More from Frank: Hill's co-host Michael Smith did not appear on Monday night's "SC6." This left anchor Matt Barrie hosting in Smith's place. Sources told me that Hill's suspension came down late Monday and Smith wanted to take time to "digest the situation." Smith skipping Monday's show was a mutual decision between him and the network, and he will be back on Tuesday... Read more... | | ESPNers/Twitter rallies around Hill | | | Via Frank's story: Hill received plenty of support from those on social media -- and from even her own company. ESPN staffer Lindsay Czarniak took to Twitter saying, "The suspension of my friend Jemele Hill is sad and disappointing on a number of levels." Some sport stars weighed in too. NBA guard J.R. Smith tweeted at Hill: "Extremely sorry this happen to you!!" He added: "I stand with @JemeleHill." | | Echoes of the Bill Simmons suspension? | | | Tom Kludt emails: A commentator at ESPN tells me that this suspension has echoes of the 2014 suspension of Bill Simmons, who was reprimanded at the time for his scathing criticism of NFL commissioner Roger Goodell. What does that mean? That Hill, like Simmons, likely found herself in hot water at the company due to commerce considerations, rather than politics... | | ESPN has a social media policy for a reason. Hill seems to have repeatedly violated the policy, even after the entire company was recently reminded about the risks of errant tweets. If Hill had written a script for "SC6" with the same points she made on Twitter, that would have been different. Hosts, producers, editors collaborate all the time on challenging subject matter. But she didn't do that, she tweeted up a storm...
But. All that said -- there's still something really strange talking about corporate "social media policies" when the most impulsive tweeter of all time is sitting in the White House... | | -- Viacom stock slumped 6.4% Monday, falling to a seven-year low, "after Citigroup media analyst Jason Bazinet slapped a 'sell' rating on the stock, adding that carriage problems for the programmer will continue." He's bearish about the looming negotiations with Charter... (Multichannel)
-- Ugh. Bad news in Philly: "Inquirer, Daily News staffers offered buyouts while newsroom plans to hire others..." (Philly.com)
-- Starbucks is introducing season two of its "Upstanders" web video series. Paul R. La Monica has the story here... Look out for our "Reliable" podcast with Howard Schultz on Tuesday... (CNNMoney) | | Lots of no-comments about Corker's assessment | | | Bob Corker said most of his Senate GOP colleagues agree with him about Trump's recklessness. But on Monday, with the Senate in recess and lawmakers scattered across the country, there was a whole lotta silence. David Gelles of "The Situation Room" tweeted this: "We reached out to all 52 GOP Senators to join @wolfblitzer in @CNNSitRoom but they either declined or didn't respond." But Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal agreed to come on the program, and he told Wolf Blitzer that in private conversations with GOP senators, they "very definitely" support Corker's assessment... | | "I think we are in pressure cooker territory" with Trump | | | This Robert Costa/Philip Rucker/Ashley Parker joint cites interviews with "18 White House officials, outside advisers and other Trump associates." "Trump in recent days has shown flashes of fury," leaving aides "scrambling to manage his outbursts," the story says... "One Trump confidant likened the president to a whistling teapot, saying that when he does not blow off steam, he can turn into a pressure cooker and explode. 'I think we are in pressure cooker territory,' said this person..." | | L.A. Times has new editor | | | Tom Kludt emails: The Los Angeles Times followed up its major late-summer shakeup with a big hire on Monday: Forbes' Lewis DVorkin will become the newspaper's new EIC. It could be seen as a very "Troncian" hire. LA Times Media Group CEO and publisher Ross Levinsohn hailed DVorkin as "one of the most transformational editors and digital innovators in the media industry." In his second stint with Forbes, which began in 2010, DVorkin took steps to change the company and its culture to adapt to digital realities. Some of those efforts, which included increased native advertising and a vast network of contributors who supplied the magazine's website with content, were controversial, both at Forbes and in the larger journalism world... | | By Francesca Giuliani-Hoffman:
-- Hannah Seligson looks at how the habit of discrediting the press for personal gain runs in the Trump family, with a feature on Ivanka called "The queen of spin..." (CJR)
-- Melanie Ehrenkranz says YouTube took down a number of gun modification tutorials on the platform in the wake of Las Vegas, but many more are still online... (Gizmodo)
-- Our problem with fake info online is much bigger than "fake news." On Recode, Phil Baker observes that junky websites filled with pseudo-reviews are now cropping up at a rate higher than ever... (Recode) | | Dylan's take on the Google/Russian ad revelations | | Monday's news on the Russia front: "Google has found Russian ads related to 2016 election."
Dylan Byers emails: Google sources are only beginning to disclose their findings, but already we're seeing how pervasive these ad buys may have been: search advertising, Gmail advertising and, most importantly, YouTube. In many cases, a YouTube account pushing politically divisive content may have had ties to Facebook and Twitter accounts. This goes well beyond one platform or one tech company. When all is said and done, this won't be a Facebook problem or a Google problem. It will be a problem for the entire digital media apparatus... | | Satire -- or racist mockery? | | | Oliver Darcy emails: Ben Shapiro's website The Daily Wire came under heavy scrutiny on Monday for a Columbus Day video which mocked Native Americans as savages who were civilized by Christopher Columbus. Shapiro told me in a statement he was on vacation and "didn't green light" the video, but defended it as satire and said it "must be evaluated by those standards." Shapiro added that "everybody needs to calm the hell down." Not surprisingly, that didn't quite happen after he released his statement. Critics said it was not funny and derided the video as racist... | | | For the record, part three | | | By Francesca Giuliani-Hoffman:
-- Collier Meyerson writes an important piece about how a reporter's race plays into how they fit into the stories they cover. "Race is as much a part of our lives as breathing, and its consideration must be integral to our reporting," the essay reads... (CJR)
-- From the weekend: For the first time, the Washington Post's editorial board used video as a format to appeal to President Trump and Congress to address the issue of gun control... (WashPost) | | Congrats to the Murrow Award winners | | I was honored to present a few of the awards at the RTDNA's Edward R. Murrow Awards on Monday night. CNN and CBS won five TV awards apiece... the WashPost won five digital awards... The Texas Tribune won four... and the radio and TV divisions of CBS won awards for overall excellence at the network level.
CBS News prez David Rhodes spoke at the end of the evening. "Murrow stood for the responsibilities that come with our freedoms," he said, alluding to some of the ongoing debates in the media biz. "Journalism isn't a passive process. It takes a great deal of effort, fact checking, and hard work to be fair -- we take that very seriously. Some platforms allow you to say whatever you want -- at CBS News we simply can't be such a platform responsibly. On behalf of all of us at CBS News thank you for recognizing that commitment, thank you for these honors..." | | STOP ME IF YOU'VE HEARD THIS ONE BEFORE... | | Another dent in Murdoch's bid for Sky? | | Hadas Gold emails: Over in the U.K., Rupert Murdoch may be facing another hurdle in his quest to own all of Sky. On Monday the deputy Labour leader Tom Watson asked the British regulator investigating whether 21st Century Fox is fit to take over Sky to include an acknowledgment from Murdoch owned News Group Newspapers, which publishes the Sun and now-closed News of the World, that it benefited from the computer hacking of a former army intelligence officer in 2006 by a private investigations firm.
Last Friday, News Group Newspapers apologized in court and agreed to pay damages to the former officer. From Watson's letter, per the Guardian: "As the phone-hacking scandal demonstrated, this is not an isolated incident but a pattern of behaviour. It is important that there is public and political faith in the CMA investigation and that you take all relevant evidence, including Friday's settlement, into account..." | | Real Housewives of 1600 Penn? | | | Ivana Trump and FLOTUS Melania Trump traded barbs on Monday... In a back-and-forth that reminded many people of "The Real Housewives..." So it was only fitting that Bravo's Andy Cohen joined Anderson Cooper to talk about it on Monday night... | | Corker's Trump comments reverberating beyond the White House… | | Hadas Gold emails: Corker's remarks about Trump are another big possible signal that the expected Trump nominee to be the next CEO of the Broadcasting Board of Governors is not a sure thing. Corker is a key part of that nomination -- as the nominee must be approved by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee -- which Corker chairs. I've been following the BBG (the agency that oversees U.S.-funded media like Radio Free Europe and Voice of America) for some time because the next CEO will have far greater power than the current set-up... thanks to a change enacted under the previous administration...
The expected nominee is Michael Pack, a conservative documentarian and friend-of-Steve Bannon who was, until recently, the head of the conservative Claremont Institute. Pack's background alarms some within the BBG and some outside observers. A separate Bannon ally, Jeffrey Shapiro, is already in the BBG and has been telling colleagues he sees it as his goal to turn the agency into a "Bannon legacy," as I reported last week. A nugget I didn't include in that piece: Shapiro has been telling colleagues he's in constant contact with Pack.
But: Pack's name has not actually been formally nominated yet. If and when it does, my sources both on Capitol Hill and at the BBG had already suggested that Pack won't have a smooth nomination process -- noting how it all hinged on Corker. Now that Corker has come out so starkly warning against Trump, there's reason to believe he would not look too kindly on a Pack nomination -- if it ever actually gets sent up... | | Catch up on Sunday's "Reliable Sources" | | New trailer for "The Last Jedi!" | | | For the record, part four | | | By Lisa Respers France:
-- Beloved radio host Delilah is known for ministering to broken hearts. She's now announced that she will be taking a leave from the airwaves in the aftermath of her son's suicide...
-- Country star Jason Aldean returned to Las Vegas one week after fleeing the stage during what would become America's worst mass shooting in modern history. The singer visited with some of those critically injured during the tragedy... | | | Email brian.stelter@turner.com... I appreciate every message. The feedback helps us craft the next day's newsletter! | | | Get Reliable Sources, a comprehensive summary of the most important media news, delivered to your inbox every afternoon. | | | | | |
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