This is a surprisingly complicated story, but it has an interesting payoff in the end. You know how they’re making another Steve Jobs bio-pic? Christian Bale was attached to the project for a while, but he ended up leaving and now the rumor is that Michael Fassbender will play Jobs and Natalie Portman might play some important character. The script was written by Aaron Sorkin, and director David Fincher was pretty interested in it, although now Danny Boyle is attached as director.
So, the film has already gone through a giant clusterwhoops of drama. Sony had the property for a while, but the project ended up going over to Universal just a few months ago. It was supposed to be a big, prestigious award-bait film for Sony, especially with mega-producer Scott Rudin attached to produce. Well, in the massive hack of Sony’s online database, the hackers got their hands on and published emails between Scott Rudin and Sony co-chairperson Amy Pascal. You can see the whole email chain here at Gawker.
The drama itself is fascinating. This is very much a “this is how we make the sausage” type of story, complete with middle-school-esque name-calling, backstabbing, bitchy Mean Girling behind people’s backs and power plays. Most of the email chain is Scott Rudin bitching out Amy Pascal because she won’t free up director David Fincher for the Jobs film. Fincher was apparently sort of interested in directing Angelina Jolie in the adaptation of Cleopatra that she’s been attached to for years. Angelina was hoping that Cleo’s script would be ready soon, and she wanted Fincher to direct her, and Pascal was using that as an excuse to NOT hire Fincher for the Jobs film.
In the emails, Rudin insults Angelina several times, writing to Pascal:
“YOU BETTER SHUT ANGIE DOWN BEFORE SHE MAKES IT VERY HARD FOR DAVID TO DO JOBS.”
“There is no movie to be made (and how that is a bad thing given the insanity and rampaging spoiled ego of this woman and the cost of the movie is beyond me) and if you won’t tell her that you do not like the script…”
“I’m not destroying my career over a minimally talented spoiled brat who thought nothing of shoving this off her plate for eighteen months so she could go direct a movie. I have no desire to be making a movie with her, or anybody, that she runs and that we don’t. She’s a camp event and a celebrity and that’s all and the last thing anybody needs is to make a giant bomb with her that any fool could see coming. We will end up being the laughing stock of our industry and we will deserve it, which is so clearly where this is headed that I cannot believe we are still wasting our time with it…”
“I’m also happy to say all of this to Angie directly as I have no need to keep her happy and what I DO have is the right to determine for myself a) what I want to do with my own time and work, and b) what I want to do with material I incepted…”
I love that he “incepted” something. I need to start saying I “incept” things. As for the insults Rudin hurls at Angelina… I have mixed feelings. Obviously, it’s really rude, stupid, unprofessional and it will probably end up hurting Rudin more than anyone else. But on the other hand, I do sort of understand why he was mad. Jobs was ready to go and Cleopatra doesn’t have a script. Plus, I’m not entirely convinced that they should make Cleopatra, and it sounds like Rudin isn’t convinced either.
Happy ending: when Bale left the Jobs film, all of the executives at Sony watched Michael Fassbender’s filmography and they now love him.
Photos courtesy of WENN.
This should be good.
If only it had been Aniston directing Rimes as Cleopatra.
Oh, well.
hahahahahha
You have me thinking thoughts with that comment…
What does Aniston have to do with this? No wonder the triangle won’t die. The fact that this guy called jolie a spoiled brat has nothing to do with Aniston. She didn’t tell him to say that.
First of all I tend to agree with Rose McGowan…when some gay men are misogynistic, they put straight men to shame. Rudin basically flings feces at all the women and just the women…and discusses fassy’s big schlong. (I think that was him anyway..these emails were so lunatic). I hope Meghan Ellison, BILLIONAIRE, the other woman he attacked hooks up with Angie and they take him down. Except I don’t think Angie cares she knows Hollywood is a cesspool run by cretins like this in certain cases. That man’s middle name is vile – the character Spacey played in Swimming with Sharks soul crushing killer of dreams devoid of humanity ‘boss’ was based on him.
This happened last Feb.? Since then….oh gee what’s happened: Angelina’s peers gave her the Herscholt award, Angelina’s been honored by the Queen of England, Angelina’s last move made almost 800 million, she completed her second feature which may get an Oscar nod and she just picked up AFI’S top 10. As usual, her eye is on the ball and she’s doing her thing despite the bullshite that other people try to smear her with.
I’m almost positive though that gawker piece about angie from a few months back was helmed by that tool behind the scenes, it has some of the same elements.
SHOTS FIRED!! SHOTS FIRED!!! Someone said a negative about her majesty A. Jolie
Jealous much written all over it. Sad old queen.
That’s DAME Jolie to you.
@muggles,
Totally agree. No one is going to take the emails of this lunatic seriously. If she’d done want he wanted (not delay his movie for her own), he would have been kissing her ass. But she didn’t, so the nastiness comes out. Same goes for the other women. They all didn’t do what he wanted so he pouts and rages like a bitch-baby (oh how I hate that phrase, LOL). I’m sure Angie, Amy and Meagan are all laughing at him.
BTW, I’m NOT a huge fan of Angie (like her, don’t love her, think she should smile more). I prefer Jennifer to be honest, so I’m not saying this because I’m a Jolie-head or whatever they are called.
Hahaha CYNDI!!
First of all, who knew Rose McGowan was so perceptive (and witty!)? Secondly, Rudin has been the top Hollywood Screamer for years. Everyone hates him, everyone hates working with him, but they’ve had to put up with him because he had so much clout. Funny that everyone else now knows it, though.
However, this email is run-of-the-mill Hollywood back-stabbing and shit-slinging. No one will be surprised by it, least of all Jolie, her husband, or her father. They’ve all probably heard far worse in their travels, and probably thrown around some similar shit themselves. No biggie. If people in the industry didn’t let stuff like this roll off their backs, nothing would ever get done.
I liked your posting, Muggles.
Wow..I hope someone spread out the plastic sheeting..cuz there’s going to be heads blowing up and making a mess all over this nice site.
Dammmmmn.
It’s amazing what really goes on behind Hollywood doors. Damn!
“Camp event” ………..DAMN, Those are Throw-down Words! LOL 🙂
“Camp Event” DAMN! …is that like this season of American Horror Story?
“Camp Event” is so amazing. I’m stealing that.
Drama queens. Sigh. Rudin sounds like a d**k.
Amazing, but it’s kind of what I expected. I work in IT with a bunch of dudes. The IM messages are so catty, it’s almost hilarious. Everyone is complaining about everyone else (valid reasons most of the time) and then smiling and joking with the person they’re mad at outside of the chats.
Honestly…I kind of agree with Rudin.
I love Fincher as a director. The idea that someone wants to put him on hold for a movie that doesn’t even have a script yet, that doesn’t even have support from the studio, is a horrible thought for me. I want MORE Fincher, not less!
As far as Jolie’s talents, I agree with him that she is a celebrity. I think she has some talent, but I think her personal characteristics and diplomatic work are far more appealing than what she does on camera in films. I don’t know enough about her directorial work to have an opinion on her directing talents.
Years ago before she was a mother and humanitarian, I always referred to her as “poorlittlerichgirldaddydoesn’tloveme.” She had the total suburban teen angst thing going for her. But everything she’s done in the last decade has totally redefined her for me. I’m not going to comment on her talent, but she’s too globally conscious to be written off as a spoiled brat.
Yeah I don’t really get it. I guess it’s a gay thing with Rudin, but typically gay slurs are more inspired.
@tiffany
Careful gurl, you in danger! Land mines ahead!!
Thanks for the warning, Cyndi! 😀
BettyRose, Angelina wasn’t ‘rich.’ Her mom died with her Dad owing them a qtr mil in back child support..it was in her will. Voight didn’t work by choice that much when those kids were growing up – someone more cynical would say it was to not be obligated to make payments. Whatever. Angelina supported her Mom and brother from a very young age with no help from dear old Dad and by her early 20s she was getting him jobs. When her mom got sick with cancer around that same time she was taking care of her healthcare and living expenses on her own. Her dad is an oscar winning actor but he wasn’t around and Angelina was a young girl basically taking care of the family. So you’re right about not being spoiled but I think it’s always been that way not just since she became a mom and/or humanitarian.
Muggles – That’s fine, but it was my impression of her before she was a well known public figure. As I’ve said, my whole impression of her has changed in the last decade – perhaps my impression was incorrect to begin with but she did give off a certain “I shop at Hot Topic” vibe in her teen years (which has more to do with artificial coolness than wealth).
BettyRose
You said it all!
Her image wasn’t great, but has improved so much. That she’s never given up on her humanitarian work cements it as genuine and not just wagon hitched to pr.
I thought the same of her then as you did. (Even if it wasn’t a literal image it was the opinion.)
What’s a camp event?
Also, I’m not that impressed with her humanitarian work. If I had a smoking hot partner and was freed from having to worry about money I’d turn all my attention to helping people too. In fact if I was her I’d give the movie business away all together and just focus on my family and helping people.
@Tiffany you’re totally right. Rudin to me sounds like a committed creative guy who’s fighting for the best outcome. Pascal comes across as weak in all this for a chairwoman. The comments about Jolie must be what people know of her behind the scenes. She’s not exactly the congenial type with her fellow actors. She’s always wedging herself in their personal relationships! It’s pathological. I don’t like her. I don’t like Aniston even more.
@Rosalee I agree. Let the denial of this story commence. I’m waiting for someone to provide a link that says see this is all made up because we all know that everyone in Tinsletown loves Angie….
Better yet Rudin is an Aniston fan. 🙂
Well, maybe not but he does have Balls for saying that.
Exactly.
No one said that everyone in town loves Angelina, but enough people love her to constantly be throwing awards and noms at her head. Aniston (since you brought her irrelevancy up) not so much.
Which is why she had to buy and hype her own product. You’d think Rudin would have bought hoecake just to be funny, but I guess not even he’s that crazy.
That said..unlike Angelina, one thing Rudin doesn’t have is ‘love’ from Hollywood…and since this ragestroke of his was written right after Angelina’s peers gave her the Herscholt award he sounds pretty bitter – could be a combo of things: not only that she is complicating what he wants (how dare she not disappear or cave in his jabba the hut presence!!) but at the audacity that she has that power and CAN. Obviously resentment and misogyny is an understatement here.
@V4Real I was thinking the same. Or he must be a hen who is jealous of her because she is beautiful / happily married / an accomplished working mother. Or he has a project with Aniston in the works. I had no idea he is gay so I didn’t see the whole “he is a gay man so of course he hates women” angle coming. Some people will never believe she is anything less than the second coming. Camp event is the best shade ever!
@ V4Real Yet after reading through all these comments I haven’t seen a comment like that.The fans that obsess over everything and the people that obsess over hating everything she does are in the same boat.
Totally agree with him. The truth is that she is widely disliked. And she is not showered with awards. She won an Academy Award years ago for playing herself. She has a very effective press team and has bought into the St. Angelina garbage they’ve been spreading since her first adoption.
Well that actually took longer than I thought. Still, some people are so easy to bait. Damn Gina, it’s a joke.t
Also what most of you are forgetting is that these were private emails that were hacked. Yes he said some negative things about Jolie. He’s allowed to feel how he wants. I’m sure he knows her better than we do. We only see her public persona and what she wants us to see. I’m willing to bet a lot of producers, actors/actresses, direcectors, etc has said negative things about other people in the business in privacy to people in their circle. They are just fortunate enough to not have been hacked if they said it in email form or text. It’s likely that the celebs we adore could be just as vile or dircect in their personal lives and if we truly knew them on a personal level instead of the image they put forth we would probably dislike them.
When JLaw and others nude pics were hacked most of us had sympathy for them. They’re privacy was violated. Not saying we should feel the same about Rudin but I’m not reading many, if any complaints about the violation of his privacy.
Edit: Pardon my grammar but I can blame that on my phone and auto correct, plus not proof reading.
Also I wanted to add forget about the Jobs or Cleo movie. I want to see those emails turned into a script; there’s your movie. Angie can play herself.
V4Real, regarding the invasion of privacy aspect, I don’t think most people consider corporate communications the sort of thing one has a reasonable expectation of a high degree of privacy in. People don’t expect that stuff to be published where the public can read it, but they’d be fools to be putting things in writing in a work environment that they wouldn’t want coworkers to see.
laura, probably the most impressive thing about Jolie is she doesn’t have a press team. She actually designs/controls all of this stuff herself. And whether or not you like her, you can’t deny her press strategy works brilliantly. People eat that shit up.
Once again, if someone does not like everything about jolie, they must be a jenhen, according to loons. I’m sure Jen put a gun to his head and forced him to send that email. Amazing how some people think the entire world must be in love with jolie or they are jealous haters.
Camp event = or < Goat rodeo?
Waiting for the Celebitchy site to implode….
Also NO to Angie as Cleopatra. Come on, that would qualify as the most blatant vanity project ever.
I have to run to work but it will be interesting to read the comments when I get home. 😉
Always thought that potential version of Cleo was a BAD idea.
And Fincher directing a historical
piece like that seems weird to me.
Actually, Fincher directing would peak my interest. Dude has vision and an own voice in spades.
Wilma I agree about Fincher. I would see it if he directed it…but I think his talents are worthy of a better project.
He’s probably the major reason Angelina wanted to do it.
muggles, I think AJ was linked to Cleo years before Fincher was mentioned.
Tiffany, Angelina is “linked” to almost every A list part that comes down the pike. People leak her name as attached just to get financing even though they know it’s not gonna happen. .it gets people talking and things rolling. I first heard about Cleopatra maybe 3-4 years ago, and I still maintain Angelina wouldn’t take on an epic like that, or want to, without someone capable with a vision. I mean it makes for good b**chy copy to say ‘oh she’s arrogant she wants to play a queen of something that’s the only reason she’s doing it and she doesn’t care who directs’ – but of course that’s an insult. That means she doesn’t read, she doesn’t think, she doesn’t plan, she has no vision – which is contradictory to the other genius brilliant prodigy who needs no PR type speculation (dont try this at home starlets, you’re no Angelina and all that!) who does the work of 10 PR agencies while ruling hollywood, she gets. What is she? A dumb neophyte spoiled by others or a brilliant manipulator? Same problems Cleopatra had if you read your history. Maybe she’s just a woman who it wouldn’t occur to, to back down from a man or cow tow to what some dck wants who she doesn’t owe a gd thing.
Hello? We (women) need more examples of this not less.
Muggles, Rudin purchased the rights to the book about 4-5 years ago. Rudin then started to develop the project with AJ, but it is his project and he owns the rights.
Yes, she wouldn’t attach herself to it “without someone capable with a vision”…but that person is Scott Rudin, a very successful producer who puts highly skilled teams together. I don’t think it is insulting to her to acknowledge the truth that she was attached before a director was chosen. In fact, she probably wanted to influence the choice of director.
I have to admit that if it’s based on the Stacey Schiff book like it appears to be, I would be the first in line for it. That book was awesome!
IIRC it is based on the Schiff book, but I have to disagree about that book’s merits- disorganized, regurgitated content from previous biographers with some imaginary scenes of what could’ve hypothetically happened mixed in (A lot of her ‘feminist’ approach to the topic was ripped off from male biographers of a generation or two ago). Most Americans really don’t know much about Classical history so they were able to promote this book as something it’s not.
Don’t thrown in “Most Americans”. How about you just say “most people” instead. There are those who follow history and those who do not, it has nothing to do with where in the world you come from.
She’s been my favorite actress for more than a decade, but the role should go to a woman of color. I agree, it would be an unnecessary vanity project.
Well (history geek alert), Cleopatra wasn’t ethnically Egyptian- she was of Macedonian Greek descent. But it’s not like white actors and actresses still aren’t shoe-horned into parts that should go to minorities, so why not switch it up?
Cleopatra was not a woman of color.
To be fair, her mother’s “race”/ethnicity is not known. It is said that she might have been Ethiopian. Either way it should be someone who is average to ‘ugly’, Cleopatra was not beautiful.
Well Cleopatra was white, sooo…
Regardless of color, she is just wrong for the part altogether.
I think Cleopatra was Greek?? Anyway, I personally would LOVE to see a Cleopatra moving staring La Jolie. I think it would be friggin awesome, even if it is a bomb, if that makes sense :D.
Is it is known , it’s written in text in Greek who are the mother and father of Cleopatra and who are her full sibling , which is what ancient Egypt court documents were written in , Greek
People are speculating because they can, in ancient Egypt the bloodline passed through the women , it was law that Pharaohs had to marry their sisters to maintain the bloodline and Cleopatra married two of her brothers… But supposedly she was conceived by some slave women , allowed to remain in the family , excepted as a Ptolemy , when it’s against ever known fact of Ancient Egypt, the House Ptolemy and dynasty .
@Brittney B, who wrote: “She’s been my favorite actress for more than a decade, but the role should go to a woman of color. I agree, it would be an unnecessary vanity project.”
Why should the role of Cleopatra go to a woman of color? She was of Greek origin, the last Macedonian descendant of a General in Alexander the Great’s army. After Alexander’s death his Generals split up his Empire and Cleopatra’s ancestor got Egypt. I forget the General’s name … was it Ptolemy?… but his descendants ruled in Egypt for at least 300 years after the death of Alexander the Great. The Greek rulers adopted certain Egyptian customs like intermarrying with siblings and cousins to keep the royal line pure, so Cleopatra ‘not’ being a woman of color is entirely plausible.
Okay, okay… I read the other comments after posting mine, and realized I was misinformed about Cleopatra’s ethnicity. I should have edited my comment accordingly, though I do (genuinely) appreciate the extra information about her lineage. Pretty fascinating.
What made her attractive was her mind. She was, apparently, considered quite the intellectual.
He’s right in that it’s a huge vanity project. I’m also struck by how entitled *he* sounds. C’mon:
“what I DO have is the right to determine for myself a) what I want to do with my own time and work, and b) what I want to do with material I incepted”
Everyone has the right to want things – but not everyone has the right or opportunity to act on those wants.
If he is the producer, then he does have the right to determine where he wants to put his money; good, bad or indifferent. I’m not saying he is all-knowing. However, Angie playing hardball to get the Cleopatra movie made, with other people’s money, so people can awe at her beauty like they did with Elizabeth Taylor is a bit shallow and self-serving.
On the other hand, NO MORE Jobs movies, please.
@ Kiddo,
I agree 100%. He is the famous/ lauded producer, he determines what he will accept/decline.
the word “vanity” coming out of his mouth is hilarious.
not the first or last time this man will earn an asshole title.
and zero cares as to how “talented” he is or isn’t.
What Kiddo said.
Scott Rudin is a mega producer with a proven success record decades long.
In this scenario, Angie (who I love before the Anglieloonies have my head) should be so lucky….
Also, this conversation is pretty standard in hollywood everyday ending in y. Pretty much full of entitled, rude A**holes. You get over it pretty quickly and or become an A**hole yourself.
Rudin’s filmography reads like a list of my 50 favorite films of all time.
And +1,0000 to everything Kiddo and LAK said.
I suppose Rudin’s entitlement is tolerated because he is one of the most successful producers of all time. The man in a real legend, not just in his own mind.
That said, Jolie kinda of won out in the end. The whole Sony/Jobs debacle clearly freed up Fincher to film her wedding. Lol
His money. Yeah he should decide on what to work on.
I started reading the whole thing and realized I needed popcorn. Plus it was getting late. But all of this is fascinating. Gotta buy some chex mix or something on my way home tonight.
No was asking him to produce Cleopatra, he could do whatever he wants with his money , he was just pissed that her project would interfere with his Jobs movie .
I agree with those that acknowledge Rudin’s incredible history in film making.
Ava, he wasn’t just pissed that her project would interfere with his. He was especially pissed that the project that would bump Fincher from his film was not supported by anyone but the star who couldn’t bother to read the entire script. He was pointing out that Cleo clearly wasn’t moving forward anytime soon, so why interfere with other projects just to appease Angie?
I thought this email from Amy Pascal to another at Sony was very telling. Essentially, she is saying that Rudin is correct, but she doesn’t want to rock the boat.
“Setting aside Rudin for a minute, Eric [edit: scriptwriter of Cleo working with Angie], is mad about Fincher because he knows that after all this money and time we don’t have a draft that could actually land a director. That’s on him alone. So he’s hiding behind outrage when he knows full well Fincher could get picked off by a good script at any studio. That’s the truth.
Angie directed a movie and now she’s ready for Cleo and it’s not ready. Fincher is her silver bullet.
Except he’s not.
He’s perfect for Jobs and we don’t even know what Cleo is, only what we want it to be. That’s the same situation as Girl. A disaster.”
What Kiddo and LAK said, standard HWood s**te talk. Meh…
It is HILARIOUS to have it thrown up on the internet! If they hadn’t hacked into people’s personal info but instead just this kind of stuff then I’d love all of it.
I’m with Kiddo on this one.
She’ll be a terrible Cleopatra, just awful. While Cleopatra was Egyptian she was of Greek descent so while she wasn’t black she was definitely more Mediterranean/middle Eastern than Jolie would be able to pull off. Angie is also already older than Cleopatra ever was. and lastly, the nose!! Cleopatra and her aquiline schnozz are legendary. That little honker Angelina sports just can’t cut it.
Just an FYI as its one of my biggest pet peeves ever – Egyptians aren’t black, they are Arabic. Just because Egypt is in Africa doesn’t make them African.
Also, I’m well aware that Cleo was of unknown decent for the most part and probably not even Egyptian anyway, but its very irritating. Like saying The Aztecs were American because its right there.
Cleo probably ate more food than AJ – body type wouldn’t be right either.
@Tammy
African describes anybody born on the continent, just as American describes anybody born in America. Egypt is in Africa, Eygptians are African. One of my “biggest pet peeves ever” is people arbitrarily shifting the meaning of words.
As for ethnicity and skin complextion, Egyptians are a mixed bag. Middle Eastern with a lot of sub saharan and Mediterranean mixing would be your closest description. Have you taken a gander at Angelinas coloring lately? She is no where near any of these descriptions.
At The time Greek were tipically blonde – dark blonde and even ginger.One population cant keep the same features for more than 2000 years and after a number of invasions.
Every person 2000 years was darker , they had no sun protection , lived 85% of their lives outdoor from the time of birth, it’s called evolution .
And people of Mediterranean , North African would be darker because they lived in desert , tropical .
Ancient Egyptian and North Africa regions were indigenous white berbers and different then Nubia ( which we would call black Africans today) they weren’t middle eastern , Arabs did not conquer Egypt until 7 th century .
Tammy, that would be why I said she WASNT black. Maybe read the comment before you decide you’re offended by it? Or your biggest pet peeve EVA!!
Tammy: FYI
1. Arab Africans exist from north down to East Africa.
2. Egyptians ARE Africans. Just because they are closest to the middle east doesn’t negate the fact that they are Africans. If being Arabic and closely situated to the middle east is the only qualification for being Middle Eastern despite your ancestry being located in Africa, then I suppose Sudanese Arabs and East African Arabs are all Middle Eastern.
3. While we are here, what’s your position on North Africans or are they excluded on the basis that they are also Arabs and therefore Middle Eastern?
Pfft!!!!
People in my country are a mix of Celts, Northern Europeans, Arabs, Romans, Jews… but everybody is surprised when they see a Portuguese who’s blond with blue eyes, like my mom.. Stereotypes…
I was born in Africa and usually people think I’m from France due to my skin and hair colour and my eyes. Doesn’t matter whether is nowadays or in the past… There were people with lighter complexion in Africa, and they are Africans…. Full stop…
This is basically the discussion of Jesus … he wasn’t blond, but ok.. whatever…
A girl can dream, but LUPITA FOR CLEOPATRA!
So with you on that, Kiddo. Also, just on this whole thing in general…LMFAO!!! HAHAHA!! Wow, that is some SH*T! If I were Rudin, I would be looking everywhere for The Leg coming after me. No wonder they are all insane and/or on something.
This gave me an actual visual of “The Leg” floating down the hallway for Rudin’s office.
How about “no” to Cleopatra, period.
I second that.
I agree!
Hatshepsut, please.
Nefertiti, Nefertiti!!! Although Hatshepsut is a close second for me. They should do both! Cleopatra’s been done, and done. (One of my favorite Cleopatras is Monica Bellucci in the Asterix and Obelix version).
Ava said “Every person 2000 years was darker , they had no sun protection” — sorry but that is patently false. Evolutionary changes in skin color are FAR more complicated than that, and happened FAR, FAR deeper in the human past than a mere 2000 years ago.
I try not to comment on stuff like this unless it’s just a blatantly wrong mis-telling of ‘facts’ (like this)… Paleontologist problems…. I consider it a public service. You’re welcome, I’m sure it’s VERY appreciated LOL.
What I’ve found is women don’t like other women having that kind of power. Oh sure we’ll take 1001 roided up superhero leading man dudes and films structured around one guy…but if it’s something other than a comedy starring melissa mccarthy….ladies have a seat.
I actually like women having power. Now what I don’t like is the idea of yet another Cleopatra movie. Also there is another thing I don’t like: generalisations about women. So please have a seat yourself.
I was just thinking the other day how Scott Rudin is behind so many great movies. I can appreciate his frustration (I hate when my work relies on others’ schedules – a fact of life though) but it’s hard to see how this won’t blow up in his face. Even if only very slightly and for a short while.
I love that this all started because someone had a folder on their server called “passwords” and it wasn’t encrypted.
Who does that???
OMG is that true? Amateurs.
But speaking of which, can the hackers target The Weinstein Company next? I would love to read the tea over there. 😀
Have been thinking the same thing about TWC.
Wow, I think some REALLY interesting stuff would come out there. Given the Sony hack, I bet all the other studios and such are scrambling to make sure their dirty laundry doesn’t get aired out too.
Oooh yes. That would be delicious.
I’ve been hoping for that too. With all the Cosby dirt coming out and victims finally being believed (and now this, a hacked movie studio), I’m really really hoping Harvey Weinstein finally gets outed as the sexual predator that he (allegedly… but almost definitely) is.
Yep its true
http://www.geek.com/apps/sony-sucks-at-security-so-hard-that-they-kept-passwords-in-a-password-folder-1611042/
http://rt.com/usa/211903-sony-hack-password-folder/
Its beyond hilarious
Yes to The Weinstein Company! I hope the hackers take requests. 😀
@Lindy79: LOL! Have you seen Sony’s god-awful Powerpoint slides? (also leaked after the hack) Maybe if they hire such amateurs for their slide presentations, they also have a bunch of clueless bumbling staff in charge of IT security.
http://gawker.com/sonys-embarrassing-powerpoints-are-even-worst-than-thei-1666403941
*makes popcorn and sits back*
LMAO.
Brenda from Scary Movie?
*Makes tea, puts feet up*
I’m buying stock in popcorn. I bet the dividends are amaaaazzzzzing.
Just read this story at the Daily Mail and can’t believe how many people applauded the director’s rudeness. I’m not a big fan of Angelina but it never hurts to be polite even when saying no to someone.
Consider the source. The Daily Mail fawns over the Kardashians and glorifies the mean-spirited judgment and objectification of women. A big-headed, powerful man resorting to name-calling and sexism? That’s their bread and butter.
I didn’t take his comments as sexist, though they were negative and about a female. But I might have missed something. What jumped out at you as being sexist? Sincerely curious, not being snarky.
I read all the emails, and it seems pretty clear that Rudin treats men and women differently. He gives male actors and directors the benefit of the doubt over and over again, but he doesn’t seem to respect his female BOSS at all… let alone other women who get in his way.
Also, I’m aware that every criticism of a woman isn’t about her gender… but when a powerful man calls a grown woman a “spoiled brat” for sticking up for her professional interests, it definitely sounds like sexism to me. Gendered slurs aren’t necessary.
What I got from the emails is that Jobs was ready to go and Cleo wasn’t…and even if it was, the studio didn’t think it was a good bet. I don’t know if that is a “benefit of the doubt” situation. If one script is amazing and another isn’t even finished yet, I think it makes sense to doubt it. I didn’t see gender paying into that mindset, but maybe it was a factor.
He’s attacking and demeaning 3 women (with stereotypical slurs and characterizations for women; their decisions and choices are ridiculed and belittled and of course the name calling…a woman is a spoiled brat for having her own timetable and organization or in Meghan case she’s a bipolar lunatic who needs meds) they get the business for interfering/complicating his more important schedule – yet and still they’re not so important in his eyes to be worthy of a phone call explaining his dillema?
I totally agree regarding Rudin’s barely-contained misogyny. Angelina was probably being a stubborn pain in his @ss, but I doubt he would have called a male actor doing the same a “spoiled brat,” basically equating them with a child to diminish their perceived power and legitimacy.
I don’t even like Angelina, and would totally believe that she has an inflated ego, but that language really stuck out to me as sexist and makes me think he was, in fact, the one behaving like a big baby.
I think he is rude, but I also see that the points he is arguing for are supported by Pascal. She emails others saying essentially the same thing: Jobs had potential and it was being railroaded in favor of a movie that none of these people had faith in. She said Cleo didn’t have a script that could attract a director, that no one know what the movie was supposed to be, but they were setting themselves up for “disaster”.
Muggles, both Pascal and Rudin didn’t attack AJ because she had her own “time table”. She was demanding that they not employ someone for a totally unrelated project. That was a power play she made, and sometimes that is a risk that blows up in your face.
As for whether he would say the same thing about men? In the Sony emails they said many insulting things about Adam Sandler and also Kevin Hart (they called Hart a “whore”). From my perspective, AJ was being insulted for her actions, not her gender. I think if he had called her a female specific insult like “slut” or “whore” or “b1tch”, it would be a different matter all together. A male can also be called a brat.
@Tiffany the email clearly said that Rudin was anxious that Angie’s friendship with Fincher could influence him to not take on Jobs. Don’t confuse being able to influence someone to being demanding. If anything, it’s Rudin who being demanding.
Also, did you read Rudin’s email to Leo? butt-licking much. Now where’s the email calling Leo a spoiled brat because he turned down Jobs.
@lila you need to go back and read that email exchange. That was an agent at WME begging Dicap. Rudin probably is a misogynist, but I have no doubt that he’s just an a-hole in general to damn near everyone. I don’t think he fondles actors like that. But I could be wrong. His tantrums and rages are pretty well known.
It also seems to be that Rudin does get that Pascal is a good producer. He evens says he has respect for her, but he’s absolutely clear in what he wants. He’s a type A, perfectionist, baby who is GOOD at his job.
It was a private e-mail, to be fair.
yup, private email, hacked and made public. i can’t really fault him, it’s an opinion made during a conversation between him and someone else. i do have to add i like jolie.
I read this a few hours ago–I didn’t really know who Scott Rudin was (except a mention in Kate Winslet’s GG speech for The Reader), but man, he came off as an asshole. I mean, I get that he was frustrated, but I’m finding it hard to believe that Angelina is a spoiled brat, when she’s trying to get a project going. Wanting a good director (who was at her wedding and is friends with her family), and wanting a good script together–to be ready to shoot soon isn’t bratty behavior.
Especially since all he’s mad about is that she was talking to David Fincher about getting the movie together soon. I mean, was she harassing Scott Rudin constantly? Telling him that she owns David Fincher or whatever??? You have to be persistent in that business. And I sort of get the feeling that Angelina wouldn’t be a spoiled brat for trying to get a movie together, that has been gestating for a long time, if she was a man.
And I have no clue why she wants to play as Cleopatra. Beyond the obvious ethnicity problem, big epic films like this ALWAYS end up being a mess. With like the exception of Gladiator. But David Fincher is a good director, so maybe it could work??? Plus, I think she does good in whatever she does–I really liked her in Alexander–she was the only redeemable actor in that steaming pile of crap. I got to the point to where I just fast forwarded to all of her parts, when I watched it in like 8th grade.
But yeah—don’t do Cleopatra. You already had your Cleopatra moment, as far as I’m concerned–Maleficent.
From my reading of the e-mails, it seemed that she was trying to block Fincher from working one movie in favor of her, but her movie wasn’t even ready to go at that time. Like the script wasn’t at it’s final draft/ ready for the screen yet. If I’m reading this correctly than I understand why he’s pissed because he could have Fincher working on the movie he’s trying to get him for instead of just waiting around until the Cleo script is ready.
Ah, I might’ve misunderstood. My understanding was that Rudin wanted Fincher to work on “Jobs” (the Sony project that never got off the ground 2 years ago), but Angelina was trying to get the script for Cleopatra together, and wanted Fincher to direct–so she was pushing for the script to be finished. And from my understanding, there was little, if anything written for “Jobs”–either that and/or Sony didn’t get it because Universal did.
That’s how I read it too. They had the Jobs script ready and were super excited about it, but trying to get Fincher to commit and she was trying to get him to commit to Cleopatra instead. And now then Sony lost Jobs to Universal while all the back and forth was happening. If that is the truth, then I can see him being pissed off and feeling like an actor was interfering with his job as a producer.
VC, the Jobs script was ready. There was an email about how the Jobs film was amazing and inspiring. “This is why we make movies”, kind of fawning over the Jobs script.
In regards to the Cleo script, it wasn’t done and Rudin said that Jolie said that she had “glanced” at about 30 pages of a 300 page script of the 2nd draft. I think he was pissed because she was trying to delay his project when her film wasn’t even near ready to start the pre-production process.
But the thing of it is that David Fincher hasn’t been just sitting around waiting on Angelina Jolie, has he? He’s directed 3 films since 2010: “The Social Network” (2010), “Girl With the Dragon Tattoo” (2011), and “Gone Girl” (2014) … as well as 3 “House of Cards” episodes (2013) and a Justin Timberlake/Jay-Z thing (2013). I mean, the email makes it sound like David Fincher can’t do anything professionally because Angelina Jolie has him tied up waiting on her ‘whims.’
Oh well, if “Unbroken” is well received and other Studios send Angie scripts (instead of her beating on doors) I guess she’ll be vindicated in setting “Cleopatra” aside to direct “Unbroken.”
Well then I’m not understanding how Angelina ‘stealing’ Fincher means that they weren’t able to buy Jobs…..because it said Sony lost Jobs, and Universal bought it. So why couldn’t he buy Jobs, and either find some other director to make the film, or sit on it until everything got resolved????
VC, it isn’t that they weren’t able to “buy” Jobs, it is that it wasn’t progressing at Sony so Rudin took it to Universal, while Pascal begged for Rudin to keep the movie at Sony. Rudin holds the rights to the Jobs movie, and he can take it to whatever studio he likes.
Essentially, AJ was blocking Jobs from being made at Sony because she wanted the director they were eyeing to be held for her project.
Emma, I don’t think the Fincher conversation went back to 2010. It started in late 2013/early 2014, after he finished shooting GG.
@Tiffany
Thanks for clearing that up! I read this at like 5 am this morning, so I might’ve been a little groggy. And so, after more reading about Rudin, he seems like a perfectionist, so it kinda makes sense to me that if he couldn’t get who he wanted (which, ultimately that’s up to Fincher to decide, not JUST Angelina), then he’d go elsewhere. Especially as big as he is.
Anytime, VC! I had to go back and read them again myself. Some of the copied emails were in really small font, and for chronological order you have read from bottom to top….kind of a confusing jumble! 🙂
At the end of the day, David Fincher is his own man. He can choose for himself what project he wants to be involve in and this time he chose to opt out of Jobs. Rudin lost a good director. Hopefully he’ll learn to be mind his language especially when writing emails.
Actually, she was not trying to block Fincher. Can you see Fincher being under Jolie’s skirt? Just like anyone, she was hustling for her project.
First off, Rudin had a different narrative when he was talking about Cleo when this project was reported.
“I read this a few hours ago–I didn’t really know who Scott Rudin was (except a mention in Kate Winslet’s GG speech for The Reader), but man, he came off as an asshole. ”
Heheh he’s lengendary. He famously hired and fired some 250 personal assistants over five years, sent over 1000 email to an assistant in a day, is known for throwing phones and other things at staff and had bitchfights with Harvey Weinstein. 😀
http://www.thewire.com/entertainment/2011/12/four-types-scott-rudin-temper-tantrums/45761/
“And I sort of get the feeling that Angelina wouldn’t be a spoiled brat for trying to get a movie together, that has been gestating for a long time, if she was a man.”
winner winner chicken dinner! yeah, like I said the other day…it’s the old “women are aggressive b*tches, men stand up for themselves” thing. Rudin comes off as kind of misogynistic here. Though, he does sound b*tchy enough that he’d probably say all of these things about a man, too.
I don’t know if you can say that with any certainty, unless you can compare irate email exchanges regarding males.
absolutely true, but he just comes off as such a whiny PITA that it would make sense that he’s like this with everyone.
I would ordinarily agree with the misogynist analysis, if this wasnt Scott Ruddin. He has said far worse about male power players. And honestly, Angie is on the wrong here. First for using her status to hold up other peoples schedules for a movie that barely has a script.
Second, because Cleo is a dumb vanity picture and she ought to know better. It sounds like shes been taking the Liz Taylor comparisons far more seriously than she ought to. And it will be problematic with the race elements and not even the theory that Cleopatra had pure Caucasian features will remedy that. The “most beautiful woman who ever lived” is white and she is surrounded by her courtiers and admirers of many races? Yeah, they can keep that movie.
She expects a project to go ahead when she doesn’t like the script nor did Rudin. Nothing is ready and she had her own projects throughout the years but when she says ‘go’, other people should stop doing their jobs to accommodate her needs? Uhm nah.
And for somebody who claims to not love being in front of the screen, she is choosing projects that require her to do exactly that and more. He’s right, Cleopatra IS a vanity project and at this point, nobody goes to the movies to see Jolie be a character, they want to see Jolie. She is a celeb, not an actor. Her choices reflect that.
While I think that happens a lot of times (men in business talking down to women), but IMO that isn’t what happened here.
He pointed out many legitimate reasons to be upset that his project was being interfered with.
There ‘ s no obvious etnicity problem. Cleopatra had Macedonian ancestors and at that time the majority of them was blonde to dark blonde with light complexion. However I cant imagine her as Cleopatra who was famous for her strong features and mesmerizing voce. We have already seen a diva in that role- Elizabeth Taylor- and anybody knows it was a major casting disaster.
Jolie wants people to fawn all over her but you know she’ll pretend Cleopatra was made “for the children”.
Yes. And what a bad vanity Maleficent was. How on earth could A.J. not see how bad the script is?
I still don’t know who in the hell he is. 🙂
I’m sorry, but the only evidence that Angelina ‘blocked’ Fincher from doing Jobs was Rudin’s perception of that. Fincher is tight with Brad, therefore Fincher is Angelina’s b*tch? Don’t think so, not by any stretch.
Fincher is known to be a slave to his own vision, meaning that it is less likely that he would allow Rudin to have his fingers all over the project. I’m willing to bet that if Fincher was hired on to do Jobs and Fincher behaved like Fincher, Rudin would’ve been b!tching about that too, especially if Angelina sided with Fincher and they pool their clout to overrule Rudin. IMO, Rudin like high-profile names in theory, but never in practice, since names come with clout and the tenacity to follow through, if necessary.
And as for Angelina and Rudin’s assessment of her, it was very petty, childish, with a tinge of sexism in there. I’ve always felt that the reason that Angelina get critiqued harsher than most is because she didn’t do what ‘sexy’ actresses/stars have done for many years – remain a pliant, up for it fun girl who only exists when a male seeks her out. Whereas Angelina got herself a life, both personally and professionally, and takes the initiative versus waiting for some man to bestow their temporary favor towards her. Add to it that all of her actions were hers, and not a talent agency/agent and it’s yielding her some impressive press and accolades, that could pose a threat if other actresses follow her lead and map out their own courses versus waiting by the telephone like a 1950s Betty/Susie on a Friday night,
BRAVA!!! +infinity……
+1
@pwal Totally agree with you. Angelina didn’t conform to the Hollywood stereotype instead she created her own norm. That’s why many people are jealous and feel uneasy around her because she can’t be controlled like so many actors in Hollywood.
And so…all the other wildly attractive women working in Hollywood are successful because…? I’m not sure how you make sense here. People like Julianne Moore and Cate blanchet are bombshells too. But you’re so fascinated by their performances, no one is really discussing their looks. I’m sure they want it that way, and bravo. As upsetting as it may be, Jolie is really no force to be reckoned with, and rudin is spot on here. Leave sexism out of it. And honestly, it’s not a secret that she isn’t liked. Peeps have been talking about it for years, but now a big timer finally says it…well. Ain’t no coming back from that.
Side note: does this mean we can call her Dame Brat now? 😉
Wow. I don’t like her, but I wouldn’t EVER consider her “minimally talented”…
I like Angie just fine, but I don’t think her talents lie in acting. I’ve only ever seen one or two of her films that impressed me.
I’d have to agree. I think she did well in Mr.&Mrs. Smith; haven’t seen her in any other action genre films, but think she’d do well in them because the focus isn’t on her emoting tough scenes.
I watched The Changeling, and while the story pulled at my heart as a mother, I thought her acting (and this was a tough, emotional role) was kind of wooden. Ditto for Salt & Taking Lives- not impressive. Not sure that she’d have gotten so many roles if not for her (in-)famous father.
Now that said- I think she is a wonderful humanitarian, probably a doting, loving mother, and is ethereally beautiful. I have no idea of her directing chops ( best of luck to her), but my opinion is that she is an average actress.
I think her other-worldly beauty carries her in film. I think she is more Hollywood star than accomplished thespian. I thought her best film, in terms of suspension of disbelief and being convincing in a dramatic role, was when she played Gia.
I don’t know if she is ‘minimally talented’, I think he said that in anger. On the other side, I don’t think she is one of the best actresses of our time, either. She does seem to have her heart in the right place regarding causes, though.
Agree with you guys.
I like Angie a lot and I think she’s quite capable in the various endeavors she chooses to pursue, whether it be philanthropy or directing. But to me, she doesn’t really excel at one particular thing and I’ve always found her acting to be decidedly mediocre.
I find her to be a very mediocre actress. Her early roles were good because she essentially played an exaggerated version of herself. I think she is someone who puts 100% of herself into her projects, and likes to switch it up and try on new hats. I applaud her for that, but she is definitely a celebrity and not an actress. People are not going to remember her for her acting.
You know I may be older than you…my first time seeing Angelina was in the bio pic Gia, about the supermodel who died of AIDS. I was bowled over as was everyone else and she was showered with awards from jump. That’s what made her ‘name’ and believe it or not, not too many people in the industry at that time even knew she was Voights daughter. Pauline Kael the most famous film critic ever did not. Perhaps because Voight’s career was in a lull when she came on the scene..he was no HW power player and actually even at the height he never had been. I won’t say he didn’t impart advice on his child, but its not like he was Brad Pitt putting his daughters who share his last name in his films.
Anyway…She won every award there is to win that year for that, her next film or maybe it preceded Gia was GIRL interrupted which she stole from Winona Ryder with a performance the late legendary film critic and many others lauded, likening her to Brando. Oscar won. Playing By heart was a smaller movie that she also stole from a pretty stellar cast winning the National Board of Review award for it. She had 1 Oscar 3 globes and 3 sags by the time she was 25. She’s continued to rack up award noms. Including Best actress Oscar nod for Changeling. She was on the short list to get an Oscar nod for A Mighty Heart, another powerful performance that earned her nods from every awards board but Oscar (too soon after Brads split I believe).
Considering she’s not even 40 yet…i think she’s had an impressive career. Along with the hardware shes really stands alone on being abke to dominate the box office on the strength of her name alone.
Most people go their whole lives with no Oscar wins, let alone 2 nods, one win, and one Herscholt Oscar (again from her peers). I guess what I’m trying to say is…
…of course we’re all entitled to our opinon…but it’s kind of bizarro to revise history and PRETEND she doesn’t have closets FULL of legit acting achievement hardware from throughout her career (NOT people’s cheese or spike awards) from critics and her peers alike.
nice try tho’
minimally talented he can say, but he hired her for his movie, there must be something about her.
She is great in her humanitarian activities but she is no great actress. She gave great performances in Gia and Girl, Interrupted but apart from that? I have never seen her as a great actress on par with for example Meryl Streep. Her performance in Changeling was so spectacularly bad that I don’t remember anything else from the movie. She was good-to-average in most of her movies. I knod of liked Maleficent but it was like watching “Angelina Jolie playing Maleficent”. She has a great stage presence and also is beautiful and has that Hollywood star quality but awesome actress she is not.
I actually like her and consider her a minimally talented actor. And she has terrible taste in projects, come on, she actually signed on for Maleficent after reading that terrible script? Still waiting to see if she is any good as a director. If it werent for her off screen humanitarian work I would really dislike her.
Call me Kreskin, but I think you dislike her anyway. Just a hunch. In fact I’ll go out on a limb and say I think her tireless philanthropy makes you dislike her even more because it makes you feel inadequate not to mention frustrated that you can’t unreservedly get your meangirl on without looking like an awful person and bitter douche who beats up on beautiful humanitarian oscar winnners.
Isn’t it nice to get a free psychological analysis just for stating an opinion on a gossip site about not liking acting skills of a celebrity? Lol…
Muggles, you are on some serious kool aid. I didnt get passed that first line because well, I know by now what to expect from the loons. Let me reiterate my post. I like her as a person, primarily because she is doing with her fame and money things I wish I could do. I like that she sits out the beach photo ops and that she isnt trying to hold court at every fancy Hollywood restaurant.
I dislike many of her film choices, and allow me to go into abit of detail here. I detest ALL the silly action movies, that actually set the work that Sigourney and Linda Hamilton had done for female action flicks back, because all she does is mug at the camera and feed teenage boy fantasies. I dislike the vast majority of her dramatic work because she really is a below average actress skating on her looks and notoriety. And most of all I hate that the two films that even come close to evidencing “talent” were really just her playing herself at the time.
My best scenerio would be to see her quit acting altogether and maybe position as a hollywood power player creating opportunities for actual talent.
I would.
*And yes, I have seen Gia and Girl, Interrupted since those are the only two examples anyone ever throws out when her acting is criticized.
I think she was playing an exaggerated version of herself at the time in those two roles. She is more of a celebrity/philanthropist than an actress.
I agree she was great in those two roles, and I agree with Peppa who says that she connected so well with those characters because of her own personality. I don’t believe she is widely known as a great/talented actress. A huge celebrity, yes.
Yah I think they “throw them out,” because she won Oscars and all kinds of legit acting hardware for her performances in those movies. It’s like winning the superbowl…you get to wear the ring until you die and that always will precede your name.
…*some* people will never know that feeling….and speaking of which….
Tell me why Anistonloons sputter ‘the Good Girl’ like Tourette’s patients when no one saw it (streaming it 15 Years later doesn’t count) and no one thought it good enough to win jack? THAT is really inexplicable and makes no sense to be regurgitating it.
I’ve seen 90% of her films as I am a fan but she isn’t great at acting. I think there was an article back in the day that basically wondered how somebody who is an OK actress with horrible films post-90s could have such a lucrative career. I think it’s her her looks and celeb status. People just want to see Angelina Jolie.
She sold her private life and it became a circus. Que the interest in her by the public. That’s how she got her clout in Hollywood.
Actually that is what I see when I see her movies: “Angelina Jolie playing…”
Actually Artemis, that article wasn’t ‘back in the day,’ it ran on Gawker this past summer. I thought it was odd because it ran not even a month after she was breaking records for Maleficent. It didn’t mention her latest blockbuster that was still in theaters and also didn’t mention her performances in Changeling and A Mighty Heart which netted her loads of acting award nods or Changeling which she got her 2nd Oscar nom post GI Oscar win.
The story didn’t call her untalented, it seemed to be saying, ‘OK why is she the biggest star around when she’s made no truly great films ala classics like the Godfather or Casablanca, or Goodfellas…?’ Which I thought was just a weird unfair position to take since no one else is held so accountable. Where’s Julia Roberts classic film work? Erin Brockavich? How about Cameron Diaz? The Mask? Bad Teacher? Charlize Theron? Monster won her an Oscar but it’s no classic greatness. Ditto Halle with Monsters Ball. Nicole Kidman? Australia? Eyes Wide Shut?
Yet there’s no question these ladies are ‘movie stars.’ I was like of all people this dude is selecting Jolie to bash, the only woman who can open a film just about.
It seems Angelina unlike anyone else, has to deliver not only Box Office and Oscar winning performances but it HAS to be a classic great best picture winning FILM that will stand the test of time too??
Jolie needs all 3 elements to justify her existence as the biggest movie star in the world..is that it? Oscars, award noms, box office record breaking, charisma and beauty….aren’t enough? That still makes for a quandary eh?
Never mind she’s the only one who puts butts in seats on the strength of her name alone. Not even that earns her respect…nor does her acting achievements.
When I read that…i was like whoa..this article doesn’t even make sense….Jolie’s got an enemy…now I’m almost positive Rudin had something to do with it. Some of the same elements in the piece are in Rudins email.
I have been an AJ fan for years. She was my girl crush for a long time. But I don’t fawn over her. People on this site have called me a hater because I have made a few negative comments about her. I don’t care because those people don’t know me. I have made negative and positive comments about a lot of celebs even the ones I adore. Angie is not exempt. BTW I braved the craziness of the barricades twice this year just to get an in person look at her. My last sighting was outside The Jon Stewart Show.
That being said it cracks me up when people use the awards that AJ has won or been nominated for as a way to prove she’s a great actress. Yet in general if you read C/B regulary you would know that a lot of posters think less of these awards. They believe they are brought and paid for as well as campaiged for. Like Viggo Mortenson said, winning an Oscar doesn’t make you a great actor. Kim Bassinger won an Oscar for crying out loud. I love JLaw but was her performance for SLP really Oscar worthy. People like Halle Berry and Paltrow have won awards but that doesn’t mean thay are great actresses.
My opinion is that AJ is a decent actress, nothing amazing. Her performance in Girl Interrupted was similar to her performance in Gia.
@Muggles
No sorry, the article I read was not recent. It was around 2010 I think and it summed up some of her stinkers e.g. the period 2002-2005 was particularly bad with MAMS giving her a much needed hit. And it was not on Gawker either, I can’t remember where I found it otherwise I would link to it.
@V4Real
She’s interesting so while I wouldn’t go out of the way to see her, if I got offered the opportunity or see her randomly, of course I would be excited.
I agree with the winning awards stuff. Loads of actors have won awards but they are sucky actors. Heck, Aniston just got nominated and Jolie didn’t (SAG), does that really mean that Aniston is more accomplished? No.
People really need to check themselves and be critical at all times, even with their favourites.
her standing went up because of the combination of her with pitt. it did with jennifer aniston as well. she would not be all that without the combination with him. separately they are less than together. other stars do humanitarian work, go to other countries and it is not heralded above all.
but read lainey for insight into how controlling she actually is – that we dont know that is because she is so controlling! wow.
She is Jack of all trades, Master of none.
Well said.
Well this makes no sense, how is she ‘the master of none,’ when she’s won the highest achievement acting awards in her industry? That’s kind of like PROOF you are a master. Psst it’s kind of like if you win the Masters Golf Tourney…you’re pretty masterful. Acting works the same way dear.
She’s also about the only woman in Hollywood that can guarantee a film will make money on the strength of her name alone – that’s also a masterful thing to be able to do.
It’s kind of why they pay her the big bucks. They don’t do it for their health. They’ve seen some masterful results when she headlines a film and they pay her accordingly.
So yeah, fail on the snarky hate fest that the most loathed man in hollywood has inspired.
It’s so weird how the absolute worst person in the room can always start a meangirl mob attack on a female because it’s easy to predict that other women will just cannibalize and pile on out of sheer bitter envy. Sad.
Well, Anything and anybody that stands in the way of that Cleopatra nonsense is on the side of Good in my book. I hit my limit of white washed North African history with Exodus.
But Cleopatra was Macedonian Greek?
I googled and what I got was that Cleopatra was descended from a Macedonian Greek line–but that 50-75% of her genetics are unknown. She could’ve been anything. I don’t think it’s off in assuming that she was part black/African.
http://womenshistory.about.com/od/cleopatra/a/was_cleopatra_black.htm
Well its also known that the Ptolemaic dynasty kept the bloodline “pure” by marrying siblings. In true Lannister style she married her brothers. I think she actually ended up married to three of her brothers. Also Her father was Ptolemy XII and her mother was her father’s sister, Cleopatra V.
Her mother was apparently black Ethiopian. To be honest, we have no idea what she looked like but I sincerely doubt she was ivory skinned with violet eyes…Anyway, Angelina is too old to play her, just like Taylor was. Cleopatra is supposed to be 18 years old and unattractive.
I believe Cleopatra was white, but she wasn’t beautiful at all.
It is hardly a concluded fact that Cleo had straight caucasian features even though there is a vested interest in pushing that view. We know she had some Macedonian Greek ancestry but many historians doubt that she had a pure racial lineage.
Lets also think about how a movie like this looks. The “most beautiful woman who ever lived” is a white woman. Do we then cast her courtiers and admirers as white people too and end up with a white North Africa? Lol. Do we cast a mixture of races in the supporting roles and end up with a bevy of persons of color curtsying and otherwise worshiping their very white queen? Shall we perhaps darken her up to create a racial ambiguity or atleast hint at that Mediterranean look (they werent porcelain skinned either you know)
Can you now begin to contemplate the insensitive mess this creates?
Wasn’t Nefertiti the most beautiful Egyptian royal?
Meh. On most occasions I would completely agree about Hollywood’s whitewashing of everything, but in this case not so much. Cleopatra was not Egyptian but Greek, from the Ptolemaic dynasty left to administer Egypt after Alexander the Great’s conquests, so she would not have been a WOC.
That said, I would still love to see a WOC take the role.
ETA: Just saw the above comments. @Virgilia Coriolanus it is unlikely that she was part African, the Ptolemies were pretty much Greek supremacists who refused to even learn Egyptian dialects, and they married within their own family.
“That said, I would still love to see a WOC take the role.”
Me too. Heck, even HBO’s Rome cast an actor who could pass for mixed race, at least; I have no clue what Marshall’s parentage is, and she may well be European, but at least it wasn’t fekking Liz Taylor all over again.
I think only one WOC has ever played Cleopatra–that I’m aware of. It was the one with Timothy Dalton.
@Godwina HBO’s Rome was a guilty pleasure of mine. I binge watched it and didn’t tell anyone 😉 The choice of actress wasn’t terrible but it was such a shame they wrote her as this whiney, temperamental brat who loses her marbles by the end.
According to the very limited sources, Cleopatra was intelligent, witty and a more than worthy opponent in the game of empire. In an ideal world, I’d like to see a WOC actress play a smart, capable non-sexualised Cleopatra in a film filled with well written political intrigue. Something in a similar vein to Katherine Hepburn’s Eleanor of Aquitaine in A Lion in Winter. I know, not very likely…
@Gretchen
I adore ‘Rome’ and mourn its premature cancellation to this day. I rewatch it frequently, and not just to ogle the gorgeous James Purefoy, though admittedly that is something I enjoy very much.
But I agree that the portrayal of Cleopatra was one of its few weak spots. I don’t think it was the actress’ fault, and I actually thought she really looked the part – small and boyish, in some shots she looked quite plain, in others quite stunning – but the way the role was written was so stereotypical. Cleopatra was a highly intelligent political strategist who spoke several languages and was a tough negotiator, but here she was a whiny, manipulative druggie with a squeaky voice and dislike for wearing clothes, whose idea of fun was killing unfortunate slaves dressed as animals.
Straight out of Octavian’s propaganda manual.
@Ethelreda
Exactly. I did enjoy Rome (although as always with HBO I have a problem with the overly-frequent, casual display of nude female bodies), but their depiction of Cleopatra really let down the series.
In fairness, we got a lot of hot nekkid men in ‘Rome’ – who can forget seeing the lovely James Purefoy without his toga? – though in Season Two the portrayal of women started to becoming annoyingly stereotypical.
But still, it’s a long way from ‘Game of Thrones’ where just about all of the adult women have been naked at least once, yet the men almost always get to keep their clothes on – even in the same sex scene!
True, true, there were plenty of lady-boners to be had. And, to be fair, if I had access to copious amounts of opium and James Purefoy I might spend the remainder of my days having sex and chasing the dragon 😉 Plus there was Atia, and she made the show for me. Calculating but also hilarious, and not a cut-out one-dimensional female villain.
And yes about Game of Thrones. I love the books, the story is amazing and the female characters are written with depth and humanity. But the show, particularly the first season where they moved as many scenes as possible to the brothel just drowned me in anonymous boob, without the payoff of seeing a naked Petyr Baelish!
Petyr Baelish nekkid? No ta! The Kingslayer? Now that’s a whole other story! But yes, the brothel scenes were thoroughly annoying and alienating to female viewers. Women have to strip at the slightest of provocations, but men are too important and dignified for that. Ugh.
Back to ‘Rome’, I agree with you about Atia, but I think in season two they turned her into an anachronistic stereotype, who all along just wanted to get married to Antony. In reality, a Roman woman like Atia would have known very well there was no way she and Antony could marry – I would have liked it much better if she had been the one to pragmatically plan his marriage to Octavia, all the time planning to keep boning has as though nothing had changed. Plus, the Servilia-Atia feud became ridiculous in Season Two, kind of a snuff video with no point to it whatsoever, and a waste of valuable screen time.
And yet, for all its faults, Rome imho is the best thing to have graced our screens in the last 15 years.
Lupita!! Not only is she gorgeous and a WOC, she can actually act unlike Jolie who can only throw in a performance when it’s type casting. Like Girl.
I read the very long email exchanges over at another site and they were glorious. So much LOLs. Nothing against Angie, but “a camp event” made me laugh so hard.
Scott Rudin is a massive jerk but he spills the best tea.
Kaiser didn’t publish Amy Pascal’s replies (co-Chair at Sony) but it’s mildly depressing that one of the most powerful women in Hollywood comes across (on email at least) as an utterly hapless, indecisive doormat with appalling grammar. She was literally begging Rudin at the end not to take the movie to rival Universal Studios.
There was also a brilliant exchange where director David Fincher ranted that he has never heard of Michael Fassbender (where has he been???) but then turned around to subsequently say Fassy will be nominated for everything. And another executive marvelling at the Fassdong in Shame!
I am off to read those emails, they sound glorious!
I was surprised by Pascal’s replies as well. One of the first ones had “u” instead of you, and I thought ugh, and then I kept reading – wow. She comes off terribly, hapless is a very good word to describe it, and the actually writing is atrocious at times for what are supposed to be professional emails.
Yes! She really came across as a doormat, allowing Rudin to insult her left right centre and barely mustering any sort of comeback.
And this is not some 20-year-old intern, but the co-Chair at Sony.
Yeah it was Sorkin who was clueless on Fassbender.
But Fincher did throw epic shade when Pascal forwarded a news wrap up type article that had as the headline something like
“Adam Driver to play Star Wars Villian; Fincher/Bale in talks for Jobs”
She forwarded to Fincher with a simple “WTF?”
And he replied
“Yes, I agree Adam Driver for Star Wars in a terrible idea”
I love that Fincher shade too. Nice deflection. 😀
And this hilarious fawning part from the WME agent asking Leonardo DiCaprio to play the role of Steve Jobs.
“Just as you must surely feel great pride in helping bring Marty his Oscar on “the departed”, everyone involved in this production desperately wants to help bring you the Academy award you so richly deserve.”
Poor Leo, everyone thinks he’s so thirsty for an Oscar. 😀
LOL! That’s awesome.
This is the best gossip we’ve had around here for a while IMO.
It really gives you an idea of how Leo needs his ego stroked!
The Driver snark, the acknowledgment that Leo wants an Oscar bad, and Ari Emanuel’s “Even Harvey” comment (which made it clear that it Weinstein is the byword for “miserable to work with” even among these assholes) were my favorite bits of this.
Whoops!
Where is this site? I MUST read it!
Hi Izzy
Here’s the link. Kaiser also posted the link in her article above.
http://defamer.gawker.com/leaked-the-nightmare-email-drama-behind-sonys-steve-jo-1668882936
It sounds like Scott Rudin is the spoiled brat in this equation.
Ikr! I’m reading his quotes and thinking, “what a spoiled brat”. God forbid any woman has clout in Hollymenwood.
+2
+1000
Ladies and Gentlemen, this has been your behind the scenes look at how some of the most powerful people in Hollywood operate. Any more questions about why the industry is so screwed up? 😉
I’m sure it makes me a bad person. I’m sure I’ll never go to heaven (which probably exists just to punish me for not believing it exists). I have no strong opinion on Angie or any of the other people involved. But I have to admit: my cheeks are still aching from laughing so hard. They are funny emails.
PS: I also like the fabulous verbification of incepted. I think we should use it often.
They are. I was giggling this morning when I was reading them on Gawker. Everyone in those emails were so bitchy and threw shade like it was nothing. God, now we know why hardly anything gets done in HW–they’re too busy backstabbing each other like 14 year old girls.
Exactly! But Rudin truly has the most fantastic bitchphrase. Oh dear me. Thank heavens I’m only on the sidelines, sniggering. I would hate to be in a world that worked like this.
He sounds like some massive dude just stepped on his girlish feet. Next thing will be throwing a fit, fist the air in frustration and break into a noisy sob in the corner.
Grow up dude.
They are EPIC.
They are funny, and they’re just not the kind of thing to take personally. Reminds me of this tool who serves on a board with me who constantly berates me and disparages everything I say…at first I was insulted but now I just have to laugh, and remember that the source is a lunatic.
So many egos in that business, I’m sure these clashes happen all the time. And now I’m going to incept some breakfast for my son. 🙂
Sixer: as a literary person, you’ll appreciate that SWIMMING WITH THE SHARKS (film/play) is based on Scott Rudin. Allegedly.
Agreed! And does anyone else find it hilarious that Ruskin is calling Cleopatra a bomb anyone could see coming when he’s trying to make a Steve Jobs movie that no one asked for?
But did you read the email about the Jobs script? It said something like “this is why we make movies”, because the script was so good.
Honestly, I feel bad for Steve Jobs if the Ashton Kutcher movie is the defining telling of his life.
I read that part. And I also read the many parts about how Aaron Sorkin wrote the script, and I just CANNOT with him anymore. Yeah the Ashton Kutcher version looked kind of pathetic, but is this a story that anyone else is really dying to see told on the big screen? I dont get it.
Agreed. They were gloriously backstabby and gossipy and egomanical, and I really hope tehre are more to come.
As a long-time media nerd/employee, this has been AMAZING to read and follow. Looking forward to seeing if Scott Rudin faces any consequences. Megan Ellison of Annapurna is also on twitter being awesome too (she was called bipolar in the email chain above).
Rudin always had a reputation as a rage monster. google it, “scott rudin horrible boss”
there are a lot of funny and even more scary stories and most of them he even confirmed.
he went through 119 assistants in the last five years.
Wow, there’s more than one spooled brat here. Obviously bitchy insults are his management style. I doubt Rudin is interested in anyone who doesn’t do what they’re told and pretend to like it.
Bad enough people’s email were hacked, but republishing them seems like exploiting the injury.
Second day in a row here with some fringe attack on Angie.
The one essential ingredient of a producer is control freak. And to be a successful one, pushy and control freak to the nth degree. There are far too many ‘Scott Rudins’ in the business. You simply learn to deal with them and or become the bigger A**hole control freak.
Jolie is by no means “minimally talented.” Rudin is an EGOT, but is also universally known as a bully and an as^.
Here is Rudin’s take on Cleopatra, presumably before Jolie had the nerve to try and thwart his plans for a movie that no one seems to want to see.
“It is a completely revisionist Cleopatra, a much more grown-up sophisticated version… She’s not a sex kitten, she’s a politician, strategist, warrior. In the Joseph Mankiewicz movie, Elizabeth Taylor is a seductress, but the histories of Cleopatra have been written by men. This is the first to be written by a woman. It felt like such a blow-the-doors-off-the-hinges idea of how to tell it, impossible to resist. We’re pretty close. A lot of directors want to do it, but there is only a handful we’ll make it with.”
Source: http://www.slashfilm.com/ang-lee-wants-to-replace-david-fincher-on-angelina-jolies-cleopatra
You know, it actually sounds pretty good there. I hate “sword and sandal” period pieces but if they modernized it, it has potential.
Scott Rudin’s temper tantrums are legendary. That is why Swimming for Sharks was based off of him.
The entire email exchange (much longer than what we see here) is hilarious and melodramatic. Why does Hollywood bother with finding scripts – they have fantastic material for movies right in their midst!
Speaking of which, can Hollywood please make a movie out of this spectacle? A Sony vehicle, produced by Scott Rudin, directed by David Fincher and starring Angelina Jolie and the Fassdong. I will pay to watch it. 🙂
i will never ever get her insistence to play Cleopatra. i mean i can sort of give her a pass for playing Marianne because of the friends reason (i sometimes do stupid things in the name of friends). but unless she’s an undead and is on first name basis with Cleopatra… N. O. Hell No. she should just stay away.
else… she can direct it if she’s so passionate about it, and give the role to a proper WOC actress instead.
btw, i thought i remembered Fincher going on about how excited he was directing Cleopatra even as far back as Girl with Dragon Tattoo–Rudin was attached as producer, Roth as scriptwriter.
(maybe i remember this wrongly, maybe it’s not Fincher? but i couldda bet it was him because i remember i was crazily devouring anything GwDT like someone possessed)
Wow! Angie as Cleopatra will be a disaster. That’s all I’ve got. I hope if and when the movie gets made a proper casting is done rather than white washing the history.
If Ange is a great director worthy of an oscar, maybe she should direct cleopatra herself? Haha.. Repeating my comment elsewhere
Rudin certainly is rude in his remarks about Angelina!
I’ve read the emails this morning and boy are they juicy. But from the tone of the emails, if I didn’t know about their relashionship, I never would have guessed that Rudin was working for/under Amy Pascal. He was extremely rude and she seemed to be in the inferior position.
Rudin is very succesful, one of the only a couple of people winning the EGOT, Emmy, Gramm, Oscar and Tony. thats probably why she doesnt want to offend him.
Rudin makes Harvey Weinstein look like the sweetest little girl in history.
He has the material and thus the power. So as we saw, he can just ditch Sony and go elsewhere with his projects.
He is right though, we have all seen how she made the iconic Maleficent a $760million disaster.
Golden.
You really need to see how many films Scott Rudin has sheparded to bigger box office, repeatedly and consistently for decades before throwing in a one off from one actor in her entire career.
LAK, you know her fanatics don’t think about these things rationally. I know you are very familiar with the industry from reading your other comments. Like it or not, Rudin is the one with the clout and the ability to make things happen, despite what her fans want to believe about her being able to snap her fingers and make a film happen.
I don’t think anyone’s denying his talent or clout–just commenting that he’s an a-hole.
@ Virgilia That’s how I feel about this situation. It could have been about an actress I don’t care about but I would have still said what a sexiest douche. He still acted like a spoiled brat whether he’s a successful producer or someone without talent or status.
Let’s be real. Maleficent was a Disney movie. You could have put Nicole Kidman in that role and it still would have been a box office success. Little girls didn’t flock to see that film because they’re AJ fans but because they are fans of the fairytale. I don’t think some people commenting know much about Rudin and his work. They’re just commenting because he spoke badly about an actress they adore. He may come off as an ass but he’s a great producer. One last thing. These were private emails so it’s not like he went to the media with his feelings about Angie.
I don’t know–you can say that about any blockbuster movie….until it does horribly. Then it’s the lead actor’s fault. Same thing happened with that awful Disney movie that Jake G. did–what was it? Prince of Persia?? I’m young enough to remember the trailers for that movie appearing on Disney Channel, the lego sets (my brother was really into legos and lego magazine) already made and able to preorder before the movie……
Plus I remember Variety (I think) came out with an article about how Disney was trying to minimize its losses because it didn’t think Maleficent was going to do that well…..
I’m not trying to say that it being a Disney movie didn’t have a lot to do with it, but adults are the ones buying tickets. And I don’t know too many little kids that are so obsessed with films (even Disney films) that they’ll nag and nag until you bring them.
And I LOVE the bitchiness of the email…haha.
Julia Roberts Snow White.
Amanda Seyfried Red Riding Hood
John Carter Disney
Just a few examples of fairy tale bombs..and no one wants to hear breathy voiced Nicole with her maligned plastic surgery as Maleficent. The fact that it was Jolie playing evil Maleficent is what brought in half the box office. Besides this wasn’t even the classic fairy tale it was about the supporting player not sleeping beauty. If it were that easy to gross 800 mil with just anyone they’d be doing it every week and twice on Sunday.
In this case it was the film itself that interested little girls, not AJ. I highly doubt a lot of 7,8 & 9 year olds were saying I have to see this film bc Angie is in it. It doesn’t matter that it wasn’t the classic fairytale, most kids recognized it as being in relation to Sleeping Beauty. For all we know little girls were probably more inclined to see it bc of the Fanning girl who they could see as a representation of themselves.
A lot of adults saw this film as well but a lot of the BO came from the younger audience. If it was all Angie than films such as The tourists and Salt would have done just as well. Mirror Mirror and LRRH were not Disney films nor were they promoted as much as Maleficent was. Also what 10 year old girl you know wanted to see John Carter? How can anyone say it’s a fact that AJ brought in half the gross, that’s just an opinion.
VC yes you’re right it is the adults buying the tickets but they are buying them for the kids. Do you really think it was the adults who wanted to see box office successes like Frozen and Tangled, nope it was bc the kids were nagging them to take them to see it.
“I’m young enough to remember the trailers for that movie appearing on Disney Channel”
This made me really LOL. The movie is only 4 years old!
And I always wondered why it failed, I actually really enjoyed it myself. Typical Disney family fun adventure.
Critics one and all said Jolie was THE best part about Maleficent….this has to be sarcasm..a 760 mil disaster? Ok..i see you. Lol
Reading the full thing on Defamer made my day.
The snark! The backstabbing! The lying!
The Adam Driver stuff was just awesome.
I know this site loves Angie but rationally keeping a director for a project with an unfinished script when you have a finished one with more prospects without a director is insane.
As far as this project goes, I believe it was Rudin who bought Schiff’s book to Sony. Angelina liked the book and had Eric Roth write a screenplay for it. During his interview with MTV, David Fincher said he would love to do “a lot of things with Angie” (his words, not mine) and Cleopatra was one of them and they are all planning a different approach to this type of epic story that it’s not going to be swords and sandals and all that stuff as he said himself, he’s not interested in that.
From what I’ve gathered from years of gossip:
Difficult male actors = troubled genius
Difficult female actors = spoiled brats
True.
Total BS. see Russell Crowe, Christian Bale, Val Kilmer. It’s the same for both. They all get a pass if they have talent.
So true
Yup and I don’t think she’s being difficult as much as being ambitious. Adam Sandler sounded like an ass which is why everyone at Sony was complaining about his demands. Angie sounds like she was pushing for a movie to get made with a specific director and budget.
I think if she was being ambitious, she wouldn’t have just “glanced” at 30 pages of her Cleo script. This sounded like she was just trying to keep one pot on simmer while focusing the majority of her attention on other things. That is understandable, but to expect David Fincher to not work on anything else until she is ready to start production on Cleo is pretty unreasonable.
Aye. It may come across as mercenary, but you can’t tell me they all don’t play the game. Apparently, it’s only unattractive when women throw around their financial power.
THIS!
This “ethnicity” thing shouldn’t be a problem, as Cleopatra was Greek (Ptolemaic dynasty)… Anyway, Angie is too old for the part, IMO
True
I was wondering aswell why so many people dont think she should play the part beccause of ethnicity. Why do people believe Cleopatra was black?? She came from a Greek dynasty that didnt ruke Egypt for long, and while we dont know for sure what colour her skin was, she would most likely not havr looked like a modern day subsaharan African. Perhaps more similar to North african or Middle Eastern? Or would those be WOC too? I am never sure what that term refers to, spe ifically. Genetics allows for many variables
Agreed. I like the part of focusing on C as strategist etc. but would like to see a younger, more versatile actress in the part.
I remember a Cleopatra TV movie with Timothy Dalton, the Titanic bad guy the the very beautiful Leonor Varela as Cleopatra. She looked her part, althrough she was way to beautiful.
The problem is in truth they were neither white nor black. They likely had something from everywhere. Their dynasty was full of brother-sister marriage + having kids with (native and foreign) concubines, ministers or slaves. The old papers name even oriental/asian Princesses as second wives/ concubines of Pharaos.
When the sister-wife who was often incest damaged like her brother-husband “couldn´t” give birth to a heir or the kids died (hello incest damages or murder) then they took the kids of one of the second wives or concubines (egyptian, ethiopian f.e) as heirs. It wasn´t that rare that male and female royals had love childs with natives and foreigners. Those kids often married “back” into the main-line. And they had the better health that´s for sure.
That was common practice from the beginning.
f.e. the famous Nefertiti had only daughters. Her husband had kids with his favourite (foreign) concubine and others. So they took the son of a concubine and made him the heir: King Tut. He then married one of his half-sisters.
Rudin can read, y’all. “Camp event” hahahahaha
I respect Angie too much too care, but what i’m really sad about is Christian Bale no longer being Jobs. Bummed.
He sounds like a misogynistic bully and Pasal sounds spineless and simpering. AJ doing Cleo was his intention but sounds like he got his ego ruffled by having to wait on her and having to use “her” people (Roth and fincher). AJ took an EP role on Mal because she exercises a lot of creative control over her projects and has enough clout for it. She’s said in the past it’s frustrating that movies take a different direction than you think they will and actors have no control. I bet that really bugs a guy like SR.
That being said, I have very little interest in a Cleo movie and they should take heed of the controversy over this whole Exodus business.
Too often in a work environment happens that when a woman puts her foot down or says no to soemthing she’s then named ‘Spoilt brat’ or ‘bossy’ or ‘impossible to work with’ or ‘bitch’ while she is just doing her job. The men involved are 99% of the times assholes who can’t accept that a woman is just trying to do her job. Grow up dude.
Yes, exactly. And in this case, I don’t think she even WAS being difficult. She was just trying to get a project made, and her friend wanted to do it with her. She’s been in the industry for most of her life, and she’s been called a lot of things, but “unprofessional” isn’t one of them. In fact, even when she *was* a bit spoiled and didn’t recognize her own privilege, she turned her angst inward and self-harmed. She didn’t act superior to anyone else.
Rudin is like the gay Harry Cohn.
Rudin is apparently a giant a-hole, but he is a helluva producer.
Fincher probably has first choice of projects, he should run away from Cleopatra. Far away. It just sounds like a disaster.
I’m amazed how into the Jobs script everyone was – it may end up being one of those great scripts that never makes it to film because it’s just too hard to make.
Angelina and Adam Sandler should go meet up for dinner to commiserate, and then send the bill to Sony.
Who?
Exactly. I had no idea who this guy is. As far as great films, I looked up in IMDB and while they are definitely known, they’re not my favorites and half of them are remakes of movies that weren’t that good in the first. place. I will give him some credit for the Addams’ Family.
Otherwise, meh. I don’t care how talented anyone is, if they act like an asshole, then that’s pretty much all they are.
If Dame Angelina, Oscar winner and UN Special Envoy, is a minimally talented spoiled brat, imagine what his characterization of Lindsey Lohan would be.
@Kaye…you forgot director of one of the American Film Institute’s best films of 2014.
So did Scott Rubin . . . 🙂
but Scott Rubin has been making Very Successful Movies most probably even before Angelina got her SAG card.
so he’s not exactly a hack either. plus he’s got an EGOT, and that’s not something to sneeze at.
i mean, of course we are welcome to comment on people’s stinky attitude, but we don’t have to diminish his achievements either.
Exactly.
Minimally talented spoiled brat who ran off to direct a major motion picture = someone who doesn’t need me or my money enough to be intimidated into taking orders and waiting for some crumbs to fall from my table.
You go Girl.
YES. This. This is exactly what happened, isn’t it? He’s butt-hurt because his female boss panders to his tantrums, but a woman he considers his “inferior” wouldn’t do it.
BOOM. Thank you
I read through all the emails last night they were a thing of gossip beauty. The ass kissing to Leo- the moronic power points So juicy! But what I get is how hard it is to be a woman in Hollywood. Rudin saves his ire for women, Angelina ( although I’m not necessarily gung ho about Cleopatra), Megan Elison, and most of all his boss Amy Pascal who he berates and lectures like a child eventhough she’s his boss.
No one notices Scott was also producjng cleopatra and angelina going for unbroken froze the project and the same guy now is calling the project shit?
BAM! Spot on!
That’s what I understand… he got mad that she went away to direct her Unbroken movie when Rudin probably wanted her to be at his beck and call.
… and now he dislikes the project he himself was pushing?
that’s what I got.
I don’t like the idea of a Cleopatra movie. They just did one about Moses.
It would be pretty, and I like the idea of the story of a powerful female being done or redone.
I don’t think it would be a “vanity project”. The script would have to be god, not campy, but it would be too expensive, IMO.
Not so much – my understanding of it is this: he originally brought the source material to Sony and wanted to develop it. Angelina expressed an interest, had her friend write a script, and wanted to get it into production with Fincher directing. Rudin didn’t think the script was ready for that, and got annoyed that they were tying up Fincher with a not-ready project when Sony did have him lined up for a ready project they were eager to make (Jobs movie). It’s not so simple as he is now calling it crap because he’s mad at her.
I suppose my thing is that if it was a man who had pulled the same switcheroo on Rudin, he wouldn’t be calling him a ‘spoiled brat’. I mean, geez, just say “Amy, keep that b-tch off my back and away from my director!”….
I doubt anyone could “tie up” David Fincher without his consent.
I read the chain of emails and laughed my face off. Most entertaining gossip of the year. Thank you, North Korea.
Anyway, one thing I got is that Angelina is powerful. Not just an actress waiting for the casting call.
just read the whole email exchange.
nothing i want to say that hasn’t being said above but:
1. love the iPhones and iPads being used to discuss Jobs film, fitting i suppose.
2. Fincher’s whole PUHleeze exchange got me snorting coffee.
Who wants to see an epic failure with Angelina as Cleopatra? And Fincher directing?? Somebody here called it a vanity project- and that’s exactly what it would be. Jolie’s best role to this day is the humanitarian one. Rudin is rude, but I get his point. But the Jobs-film by now is a bit doomed, too. Fassbender, hmmm, not sure, though he DOES have the nervous quality of Jobs. I just wonder about the intellectual one…Bale, in my book, was the better choice. All in all, a very bitchy business, but we knew that, right?
Because Bale has the “intellecual quality”? What is this nonsense? Ahahahah!
Fassbender IS an ingtelligent actor,he has shown a great intelligence not only in the choice of his roles,but also in the way he has studied them.. yes,studied..
Angie has just as much right to experiment and fail, as any white guy. Here’s an article about Donald Trump’s FOUR corporate bankruptcies that might put it in perspective:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/clareoconnor/2011/04/29/fourth-times-a-charm-how-donald-trump-made-bankruptcy-work-for-him/
Unless you’re oil money or inherited wealth, who else but a white guy can come back from freaking $900 million in personal debt? (yeah, I know, gotta verify that number in case the fact checkers at Forbes were too lazy to do it).
Scott R just sounds like an ass.
He didn’t talk crap about David who may chose to do Cleopatra, even without a script, instead of Jobs, but Angelina is just being spoiled because she wants to secure a director she wants who also may want to work with her. The one throwing the tantrum and sounding like a brat is Scott. I’m not a fan of a new Cleopatra movie, but this Scott guy sounds like a real ass who doesn’t respect women.
I get that he’s angry and dramatically acting out, and I’m sure he’s a prick, but I think we all agree there is some truth to the shade he throws Jolie. We all like her, to varying degrees… but how much of that is actually based on her movies? She’s not a bad actress, but she’s no Meryl Streep either. She’s OK, and her movies are generally OK. I’m hearing that her directorial debut is likewise OK. Frankly I would have preferred it if she’d stayed in the action genre, because that’s where she’s in her element. But she decided she wanted to do dramatic roles, direct serious movies… Let’s just admit it: alot of her fame is from OUTSIDE her filmwork, yet she carries cred as if she’s selling the box office out with every film. I’m just saying, I haven’t truly been impressed with her on film since Tomb Raider.
… and I will add this: maybe that’s why she’s preoccupied with doing a big, epic film like Cleopatra: she really does NEED an epic hit at the box office, doesn’t she? All the better to seal her grand “myth” with?
Angelina has won every single acting award that exists – fact.
Angelina’s movies have earned around 5 billion at the box office – her latest 750 million and counting – fact.
How about checking the facts before putting another woman down?
Btw – do you say the same about Clooney who has massive flops after flops? So his projects are also vanity ones?
Seriously I applaud Angelina for trying to make in Hollywood as a female director. Just imagine the hatred and opposition she is getting from her peers. It’s probably a lots more then women here who constantly try to bring her down.
I really don’t think anyone expressing her/his own opinion here on this *gossip/opinion* site is tantamount to “putting another woman down”/ trying to “bring her down”. Everyone’s opinion is as valid as your own, which you too, are free to express.
Yeah, I have no problem saying that Clooney is massively overrated as an actor. And I agree with AntiSocialButterfly that everyone is entitled to their opinion. The ‘putting other women down’ mantra is tiring, it’s very Taylor Swift-like. Being female doesn’t require that you worship at the throne of all other females.
I like AJ, but I don’t think she is one of the greatest actors. Shrugs. I’m not even sure that she thinks that herself.
“Just imagine the hatred and opposition she is getting…”
Don’t have to imagine it. It’s right there in print.
We’ll probably get trashed by some Loonies, but i agree with you. She IS ‘minimally talented’ and most of her fame is because of her beauty & humanitarian work. Her crazy phase of making out with her brother & swapping blood with Billy Bob and then settling down to adoptive parent & UN Ambassador certainly helped. Then hooking up with Brad cemented it. The tabloid fascination has helped her career just as much-if not MORE- than starlets like Blake Lively. She can be very cool in action flicks like “Mr & Mrs Smith”, and has had her moments in stuff like “Girl, Interrupted” (altho I still maintain she was basically just playing a version of herself in both movies). But her accent in Maleficent was so cringe-worthy it nearly ruined the film for me.
One more thing–does noone remember the dreckitude that was “Alexander” with Colin Farell? Walk away from Cleopatra, Angie. Just walk. Away.
That’s how I’ve always felt about her – she’s more celebrity than actress, IMO, and much of that fame is built on her beauty and her personal life. I’ve liked her in 1 or 2 movies, but was never all that impressed with her in anything else. She’s OK, just not someone who’s films I make an effort to see. I can appreciate that she’s tried a variety of genres and has had box office success with some, but when it comes to acting talent, I’m far more interested in people like Julianne Moore, Amy Adams, Meryl, Cate Blanchett, etc.
I can’t speak on her as a director though as I haven’t seen either movie, but in general it’s good to have another female director in the game.
Actually, Maya, she has won several awards, but not an Emmy, Tony, or BAFTA.
Jem, I completely agree with you.
I like Jolie, but I have the nagging suspicion she is definitely not what she appears to be in the press. But hey, more power to her for being such a successful player and manipulator, in the end that’s what everyone does if they want to succeed.
LOL! He is whining like a toddler. Ashton Kutcher was in Jobs movie already which was made last year, he looked like Steve Jobs too. Why make another?
Angie can do very well without him however great he is at his work. I hope she won’t do Cleopatra, she is better at directing whatever project she likes than acting in one.
I honestly thought she made Cleopatra years ago, and that was the movie in which she supposedly fell in love Colin Farrell.
Also, I am not sure they need to make another Jobs flick. Ashton Kutcher already nailed the role and I don’t think anyone else could come close to touching his performance. *snark*
The book by Stacy Schiff is great.
I do have a question because I am not sure if the same thing is happening here that happens at my company. Is Angelina a spoiled brat because she is a strong, competent woman who successfully gets things done and doesn’t just do whatever the men want?
I’m asking because my manager is female and doesn’t put up with bullshit from other departments (she is also the only female manager). She gets a lot of projects moving. The men constantly put her down and I think it is because she doesn’t just smile and lie down for them. Does that make sense?
Ding ding ding! That’s the way I’m seeing it. She gets what she wants and is firm about what that is and in some other man who feels emasculated by that,she is a spoiled brat. If it was a man, however, who was like this. He would be congratulated and looked up to.
So, Angie is cockblocking a movie from being made because she wants to make a movie with the same director even though her script is incomplete (and could be completed in the time Fincher films Jobs) and somehow this makes her a strong, powerful woman? It’s like moving on to a new boyfriend (movie project) but wanting to make sure no one touches the ex so he’ll still be around when she wants him – tacky, rude, bad boundaries and yet she’s a hero? I think she’s awesome in lots of ways, but given that this is what it sounds like she’s doing, why would you congratulate her?
Well
she isnt block shit , she has a movie and wants the director they promised her
scott gave her fincher and now is taking him because this project as better chance at oscar
She’s not ready to film the movie so she doesn’t need the director. There’s allegedly no script. And she already bailed on the project once before, for 18 months, to direct this film. Should Fincher just never film a movie because maybe one day she’ll actually film this movie (which should star a woman of colour since it’s about one)?
Furthermore, Fincher already abandoned the project himself in 2011, so he wasn’t that eager to work on it. This also happened after Jolie was papped maybe a year before heading out of his office with a script, yet now we find out that nobody liked the script in the first place so why all that talking about a project that seemed doomed from the start? Why bother demanding a certain director when he removed himself before?
Unprofessional and stupid to put things like that in writing.
+1
So they should communicate with smoke signals or what? It was their private communication.
This. All I kept thinking is how could they have put this all in writing?!? You never do this. Shit talk all you want in person and on the phone, but you don’t do this in writing. People reply all, forward, and send to wrong people all the time. Same reason I hate email threads. There’s always an idiot who shares too much and/or with the wrong people.
If I had to work with these people, I would probably weigh 98 pounds, have bleeding cuticles all the time, smoke, drink diet coke constantly, and then start drinking pinot noir each day at 4 pm. Granted my anxiety runs a little high, and I can’t stomach confrontation well, but I am on edge just reading these emails. I would not want their lives. They seem so soulless.
I completely agree with you. I worked for lawyers for many years and this type of thing was very common. The aggressiveness, rudeness, etc. I honestly think this profession caused my anxiety which I am currently on disability for. It’s an awful way to spend 10 hours a day, five days a week, that’s for sure.
All this proves that Angelina Jolie is powerful to me.
+1000
Pfft. He’s totally projecting because he’s the one that comes across as a spoiled brat diva. And wtf is up with all the Jobs movies that are coming out? Didn’t they see how much it flopped with Kutcher? Come on. Also, as campy as it may sound, Angelina did Maleficent and it ended up being a huge blockbuster, so I seriously doubt it would fail.
Movies like Thor, Snow white and the huntsman, and Ever After all did very well at the box office so a movie like Maleficent was probably a no brainer. Doing a big production like Cleopatra could potentially be a disaster.
this is all pretty hilarious, and petty, and unprofessional, and bitchy, and back-stabby. i love it. but i do feel bad for them that what they thought were personal communications have leaked. that really sucks. (and i wonder if these people talk to each other like this in person, or just over email.)
Yes they do talk to each other this way in person too.
yikes. i’d hate to work like that, i am way too non-confrontational for $hit like that. lol
Yeah, I was not surprised/offended by all the name-calling and bitchiness in the thread… But instead it was that email from the agent to DiCapprio that was the real low point for me. Barf.
So, Fincher isn’t allowed to work without permission from Mommy (Angelina)? I guess Angelina said it was okay for him to make Gone Girl…so good call on Mommy Angie’s part, as were Fight Club, Seven, Ben Button, etc. I wonder when Mommy Angie will let David out of the house next??? BTW- EVERY Angelina movie is trashed as a disaster for twenty years running, by naysayers from all sides- none more than Maleficent. It’s almost as if the more trash they throw at her, the more success she has- great things happening to great people- it’s beautiful!
Does he own the rights to Cleopatra too!?
He has secured the rights.
On Nov 3, 2014, at 10:52 PM, DeLuca, Michael wrote:
Shame just makes you feel bad to have normal sized male genitalia
LMAO!!!
Oh my god these emails are A-MAZING.
SO MUCH GOODNESS!
lol
Scott Rudin is a mega asshole, but he’s also pretty much the most successful producer ever. I cackled when he called Cleopatra Angelina’s “$180m egobath”.
If anyone can end a career in Hollywood, it’s Rudin.
Jennifer Aniston got an SAG nomination…..
I am speechless
(sorry this was the only place I could think to post it)
Not to thread hijack by responding, but she hustled HARD, wasn’t going to get an Oscar, and needed some kind of acknowledgement, I guess (no shade). IDK. Good for her?
Wow, heads will explode on this site. Gonna need lots of popcorn today!
Heads will only explode when Jen wins an Oscar
Then Hell will freeze over
As for Angie she will never respond to Rudin’s insults.
She will probably direct Africa project next.
It is called Lobbying. Aniston…instead of Chastain, OR Swank…SMH.
Bahahahaha… this is a sipping my tea kind of day.
@Lindy79 Jenn got a nomination and Unbroken nothing. Which for this round isn’t a surprise, but do you think Jenn is enjoying this morning? In light of all the emails. (Promptly making a donation to charity for being so catty during the holiday season-me, not Jenn).
My goodness what a jerk! Even if he were 100% in the right! which I absolutely do not think he is, writing something like this is unprofessional, rude and ten shades of unacceptable. Talent, success, being a great producer – none of that excuses his attitude.
A bit surprised that so many people think that yet another Jobs biopic in such a short time is a good idea, but a new take on Cleopatra isn’t? I mean here we have an opportunity for what could be a good historical movie (admit I am a sucker for them) presenting a strong woman who actually stood up to Rome, but we shouldn’t have it made because it has been done before? I actually think AJ as a queen might work very well, particularly if Cleopatra is depicted as a warrior/strategist and politician rather than just sex kitten. Also in the interest of full disclosure, I do like her so when you combine a historical with an actress I like, sure I will watch it. Would it be a vanity project? If it’s a good movie I don’t really care, do I?
Going back to the email exchange, I really hope there will be some consequences for this loud mouth arrogant guy. Try to imagine the comments in a different setting – any other industry like say auto manufacturing where a division director tells the CEO that a country female manager is trying to get one of his top guys to open a new office in Australia. And then spouts that trash about her. Would you not want him fired? I would.
I think it’s very well established he’s a total jerk. It’s his nasty response to a power play on Jolie’s part. Good for her for fighting for her interests, but I think there were plenty of big egos in this room.
Nodding in agreement! It just makes me feel empathy for any woman in HW who has to fight twice as hard as a man to get what she wants and then of course she is called names. Haven’t read the whole email exchange but was he throwing the same kind of comments towards Fincher? Because at the end of the day doesn’t a director have some say in what he chooses to direct or not? Or is the assumption here that AJ just hypnotized him and he would just follow along with her wishes. Either way, I hope there is some sort of consequence for Scott. His attitude is unacceptable. Having a disagreement and arguing about it is one thing, trash talking in a professional setting is not.
I agree with Angie fighting for what she wants. IMO, Angelina is a strong woman and some men are not comfortable dealing with a woman with her strength. I never believe Angelina is a spoiled brat. She knows what she wants and fight for it.
however, keep in mind that those were their private (well, work-related) email exchanges that they thought would remain confidential. regardless of whether or no one agrees with their opinions, they weren’t supposed to be made public. i feel bad for them.
I am not suggesting for a minute that the hackers had the right to go and get private info – emails, salaries, whatever. But the emails from Scott to Pascal are in the context of work and therefore one would hope they would and could keep it civil. Never mind outside hackers, can you imagine using this kind of language on a corporate network at your job (I mean a generic “you”…?)
Employers have the right to monitor and act upon emails sent using the work address and there are usually codes of conduct around it particularly for that reason, we can’t talk – and email – at work using whatever language we desire and that we may employ privately with our friends. It’s just wrong.
Eh, I want more. Someone hack into Harvey Weinstein’s emails or something.
lol. That would really be something!
+1
I imagine a lot of swearing, threats and comments on hot young actresses, rather than fassdong!
Angelina is too old for Cleopatra.
And too pretty. Cleopatra was in no way classically beautiful.
Those e-mails are a reminder of something a lot of us learned long ago. Never write/type anything that you would not care for others to read.
No lies detected. She is a spoiled brat.
of course they are. no one is saying they aren’t. but that’s a red herring. these people were discussing their take on one specific actor, jolie, not actors in general.
Uh oh.
they hate everyone but Jolie
Wow! What a massive, ego ridden hissy fit! This makes me crave to know what else goes on behind the scenes? To call her a “minimally talented spoiled brat” seems harsh considering she has won an Oscar. At least some of her industry peers voted that she was the best that year. Hold my calls, I’m off to read the rest of the e-mails now.
Gwyneth Paltrow won for goddam Shakespeare in Love…
Driving Miss Daisy over Dead Poets Society…
Oscars have been bought and paid for or just innapropriately given for kicks and giggles for year…
Yes they have and certainly brings to mind the tragedy that happened in 2013 when Jennifer Lawrence won over other better performances……yeah bought and paid for by Harvey.
what does camp event mean
cheesy, doesn’t have substance
Thank you. I wasn’t sure either. Any chance you can tell me what EGOT stands for, sarah?
Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, Tony. Scott Rudin has them all!
Wow someone in Hollywood actually had the balls to say what everyone is thinking. To have been there had he actually said it to her face, would have been beyond awesome.
Everything he wrote is probably true. The script stuff and the Cleopatra stuff sounds 100% on the nose… but I still love Angelina Jolie!
He is a legendary jerk, but I think he’s in the right here (and it’s not like he was saying this publicly, or even to Angie directly).
-he gets the rights to Cleopatra and brings it to Sony
-Angie decides she wants to play that role and aggressively pushes for it even though she’s totally wrong for the part (the whole point of the new Cleopatra story they’re trying to tell a more accurate story that isn’t from the angle of “she’s the most beautiful woman ever” because she wasn’t — they need someone much younger and less attractive than Angie in that role)
-having worked her way into the project against Rudin’s wishes, she then decides to go to Unbroken for 18 months, leaving the story *he* brought to the studio and she fought to be in now just sitting around waiting for her
-meanwhile, Rudin is setting up a promising Jobs movie with a completed script by Sorkin (who’s a dick, but based on The Social Network probably wrote a good script) and is working on Fincher directing (again, probably a successful re-team a la The Social Network)
-meanwhile, Angie comes back from Unbroken and even though Cleopatra doesn’t have a script anyone (including her) is happy with, she tries to prevent Fincher from doing the ready-to-go Jobs movie so that he’ll be waiting around whenever Cleopatra is ready
Yeah, if I was him, I’d be pissed too.
That’s pretty much what I got out of it too. In addition:
He seems to be saying that he pitched it in a certain way, whatever his vision was, and in a certain budget slice. The script he’d read doesn’t seem to have adhered to how he wanted to make it and the $180 million “ego bath” and “vanity project” comments indicate to me that the proposed budget was far above what he had in mind for the film.
The guy owns the rights to the source material and is producing it. His property, his money, I guess he probably has every right to not have any intention of allowing it to be highjacked in a direction he doesn’t like. I also imagine that given his track record, he’s probably got a pretty good feel as to budget/profitability.
Yeah, that’s what I got from it too. It is not the he thought at first that Cleopatra was an awesome project and now he’s changing his story, it’s that the way Angelina wants things doesn’t go with his vision. He has the rights and wants to produce it the way he envisioned it, I don’t see anything wrong with that. I actually see very reasonable points in his arguments. I would be pissed too.
I read it that both of them hated the script–and Angelina wanted to go forward with it, with rewrites to the script, and to see if Fincher would direct it…soon. But that Rudin wanted to do Jobs with Fincher first…..
How long does it take to shoot a film? 2-3 months? I doubt a Jobs film would require much in the way of location scouting etc. He commented that Roth had been working on the script for 2 years and that no one was happy with it. I would imagine that rewrites would take at least (and probably more) than that amount of time.
I also noticed a comment or two in which Rudin implies that AJ was bypassing both the studio and the producer in regards to script changes without any consultation with those who are actually paying for it. While she probably had final script approval, she seems to have been seriously overstepping the boundaries of what she was signed on to do. Which was star in the film, not “co-produce” (he makes that point as well). I really can’t say I blame him for being pissed, pretty much any project in any field with too many cooks, especially if they don’t agree on the final recipe, is headed for disaster.
Actors sound like a nightmare to deal with. They wanna be singers, directors, writers & now producers as well. They want to stick their greedy hands into everyones business.
Reading that vomit-inducing email to Leo Dcap, it doesn’t surprise me – if they are written/spoken to like that on a regular basis their egos must be planet sized.
Actually Amy Pascal reminded Scott Rudin, he did liked the Cleo script. I think people missed this exchange:
Scott : “If you don’t tell her that you not like the script…. witch, let me remind you
SHE DOEN’T EITHER”
Amy : “I liked the script we got in December so did you” [from Rudin]
Do not pretend all thoes things did not happen cuz it makes me feel like
I’m going crazy
And Pascal, was not completely honest with her friend Scott, about the major consideration why they’re pulling the plug on Jobs:
[quote]As the project progressed, the studio expressed concern about the cost and its ability to find financial partners.
“I think Danny needs to rethink how he wants to do the movie,” Pascal told Rudin on Nov. 13 in a reference to director Boyle. “We are not gonna get anyone to help us out here at this cost with this cast.”[/quote]
[quote]Meanwhile, sources of co-financing for the production, including Ellison’s Annapurna Pictures, Village Roadshow and New Regency, have passed, Doug Belgrad, president of Sony Pictures’ motion picture group, tells Pascal.
“I love the script but I can’t do this to the company,” he wrote on Nov. 13. [/quote]
[quote]On Nov. 21, Comcast Corp.’s Universal Pictures picked up the Jobs film.
“Even if this movie becomes the greatest movie ever and wins the Academy Award, we will be fine,” Pascal wrote to senior management. [B]Then, she hints at another factor behind her decision, how Sony Chief Executive Officer Kazuo Hirai and other senior executives might view a film about a competitor, Apple.[/B}
“And between us, how would we like to be at the screening with Kaz and Yoshida-san when they see the movie for the first time,” she said[/quote]
source: http://arts.nationalpost.com/2014/12/10/leaked-emails-reveal-bad-blood-after-sony-execs-handling-of-steve-jobs-biopic/
Angie must be doing a ton of balcony smoking today, but somebody had to say it. She is a really lousy actress and this “St. Angie” stuff is just setting her up for failure. Humans are fallible and Angie is human, lest she forget. The castle walls won’t stand forever, what will she do when her kingdom falls (as they all do)?
Sorry but you don’t walk around with a camera crew to show what a Humanitarian you are if you don’t want to be seen as a “saint”. Angelina sells every aspect of her personal life to show that she is not just an actress. There is a reason she doesn’t do regular interviews as other people in Hollywood. Dame Angie is “not like other women.”
I’ve never seen Angelina call herself a saint or really even act like one. People make up their own perceptions of her. “St. Angie” is only used by people that don’t like her or gossip sites. It’s a word people use to be snarky. I don’t even think I’ve ever heard a fan call her “St. Angie” yet aren’t those the people that suppose to fawn over over her? Exactly.
@Jessica the tabloids and haters sarcastically calls her Saint Angelina. Her charity work and accomplishments rub people the wrong way because it reminds them of their own inadequacy.
LOL now an actress is similar to the President of a country? like i said she’s not just an actress/director/humanitarian. Saint is the only way to describe her.
hahaha, well, if you want to worship her as a saint, that is on you. I hear that people from the past worshipped what they could not understand.
.
As for me, I am just a fan, I like her drive and her films are fun or thought provoking, I admire her good intentions and her charity work. That’s it.
Oh! Okay, see I guess I just didn’t understand that I was a jelli h8r!!11!!1 but now that you’ve broken it down for me I totally get it. If you think her work for the UN is awesome, you should research what the UN does. For someone who fights war zone rape, it is interesting that she is involved with one of the big offenders.
Makes me think of Tiger Woods. The cracks are beginning to show.
Dream on!
I thought I’d hate the guy, but after reading the whole messy thing, he’s actually right and the only one with a brain it seems.
Damn these Hollywood people are at the kindergarten level. Judging by the e-mails only, I can’t believe Pascal is as important as she is in the industry. I mean WTF.
These people are ridiculous, they’d get fired from a grocery store behaving like this, let alone a multi-million dollar corporation.
Also, do people really use their e-mails for this purpose?? Is this a generational gap thing? Who writes such long e-mails that sound like my 15-year-old sister’s rants on the phone.
On a side note, that e-mail the agent wrote to DiCaprio!!! OMFG I guffawed at the language and the amount of shameless cringeworthy ass-kissing, my GOD.
I got nothing really new to add, but I will say this: Why do Jolie haters keep acting like they aren’t being allowed to express their opinion here? Clearly you guys are allowed to post here. And even though Kaiser might be a fan of Angelina, she still posts stories claiming she’s having an affair with everyone she works with and every time a tabloid claims Jolie and Aniston are gonna have a HUGE SHOWDOWN ON THE RED CARPET!!!
She might like Angelina and Brad but I think she likes the clicks articles about them generates more.
im not itching to see a cleo movie
but id watch it all day before id watch another jobs movie
I agree the Cleo movie might have been a bad idea, but why all this drama to make a Steve Jobs film, when there was film out just last year?
Wow… what a d-bag. I’m not even a big AJ fan but you can see this is sexist from a mile away… someone in hollywood calling a woman out for having an “ego”… really? In the land of giant egos? this guy is clearly a misogynist. You’d be hard pressed to hear him talk that way about the male equivalent of a celebrity with AJ’s stature. what a PIG!
Hilariously bitchy. There was no reason for either of them to mince words in behind-the-scenes emails. I’m sure all will be rainbows and unicorns amongst all again, once they get a box office winner out there.
@db, I doubt all will be well. This Scott Rubin has a track record of being a bully. The person I feel sorry for is Amy because she came across as being soft instead of standing up to SR. I know Angie can take care of her self because IMO Angie is a strong woman and I’m sure Brad has her back.
Amy Pascal didn’t get to where she is because she’s too fragile to handle it. And Rudin can get nasty because, a) it works for him and b) look at his track record.
Wow sounds like somebody needs a nap and I’m just not sure about ‘Angie’ (he has some nerve) as Cleopatra. Of course I’m basing this solely on her role in ‘Alexander the Great’. Love her but she made me cringe watching that movie.
Definitely not a Brangaloonie, but… if she’s such a “spoiled brat” yet her image is as pristine as it is… doesn’t that make her pretty damn talented?
No. Money can buy anything and people are gullable.
I really think the fabulous Eva Green should play Cleopatra. There’s something very beautiful yet somewhat plain about her face.
I couldn’t agree more! Eva Green should be in everything, imo
Jennifer Anniston is having a good day today.
Showing myself out now.
Poor thing needs one. She’s has so few of those lately after all her recent movies either bombed or didn’t even make it into the theaters.
Rudin totally foreshadowed this.
From: Scott
To: Amy
“…We will end up being the laughing stock of our industry…”
Yes Scott. Yes you will. But not in the way you imagined. North Korea and/or China are somehow involved? Over a Seth Rogan film???? This whole thing reads like a Tarantino revenge movie with the twists of M. Night Shamalayn. I LOVE IT!
My thoughts. Everyone involved didn’t come off great. AJ didn’t come off so great here either. Amy was trying to keep everyone happy. And it sounds like Rudin is legendary for a reason. Dear god his tanturms! But I have to say he can see through a ton of bs. Cleopatra DOES sounds like an unnecessary ego bath that would only further Angelina’s reputation. Rudin sounded like he was pitching art and a really interesting take on Cleopatra, while AJ turned it into a multi-million dollar “camp-event”.
I think AJ is a mediocre to average actress. She’s an INSANELY lovely person though. I wish she would get her hand’s dirty in more indie films and not studio productions. Then I’ll believe she’s as dedicated to her art as she likes to say. But she probably does all this bs to make money for her humanitarian efforts anyways. If that’s the case more power to her.
Yeah Rudin is a complete and utter a-hole and difficult, but he’s NEVER made it seem like he wasn’t. Team America: World Police based Kim Jong-il’s characterization on Rudin (Good lord this gets better and better) and Rudin was supposedly pleased. His antics are LEGENDARY! I WANT MORE! I love what’s happening behind the scenes.
There is nothing in this. Nothing here. Just some bullying abusive misogynist throwing a tanty and saying stuff he would never have the guts to say to Angelina Jolie. The sexist, weak pissant would shit himself if he were ever in Angelina’s presence, and lets face it, we all know that. Nothing to see here. But watch the dregs of FF, JJ and DListed flood these boards thinking they’ve discovered some hot stuff. The joke is on them. PMSL This does nothing but show up Scott Rudin in a bad light, and Angelina in a good light.
I agree.
Uh, he’s been in Angelina’s presence many a time, and he definitely has no problem saying what he thinks to actors faces. Why would he, he controls the material they act in?
He is the one in charge. And he is entitled to his opinion in private conversation. He apparently is a sexist pig and apparently can get from zero to bitch faster than Ferrari. But Angelina comes of like a spoiled and vain…well, brat. This conversation certainly shows both of them (SH and AJ) in very unflattering light. He comes across as a bitch and she comes across as very unprofessional. I would be frustrated too if I were him. And he was in her presence often I guess. He is a producer. He is the one with power and money and apparently he doesn’t give a fig about Angie or any other star.
I fail to see how Jolie is described as doing anything spoiled, vain or bratty. Nothing Rudin says indicates that. It just indicates he doesn’t like what she has done or is doing without any context at all.
If she talks to the scriptwriter why is that her responsibility to report that to the producer – why wouldn’t the scriptwriter himself discuss with the producer or studio head what ideas he has has been discussing with others. It’s the scriptwriter who would know if he heeded anyone’s suggestions. Same with other alleged sins and omissions Rudin whines about. There is just nothing to go on except his tantrum about a woman who is involved with a script that HE took to her to be involved with.
As for Fincher and Jolie discussions, well, they are personal fiends and why would Jolie feel the need to report to the producer all her conversations with Fincher especially let’s say during personal events?
Rudin is famously a misogynist and control freak. For him Angelina Jolie, a woman who wants to exert some control in her life and work, must be the perfect storm. Well, if he brought the project to Jolie in the first place without knowing her strength as a woman or thinking he could control her, then he is a fool.
I guess Christmas came early for the Aniston loons.
Wow, I didn’t know I had to pick a side here. I can go see both their movies.
Business is full of successful corporate blowhards and it’s also full of successful people with who are able conduct themselves with decency. It’s not like being a volcanic asshat is a qualification for success.
Oh, I don’t think all of them feel so entitled. It’s pretty clear from the emails that Bale and DiCaprio exist on a pretty small, exalted plateau.
My guess would be that Michael Fassbender might not be feeling so awesome today and that Adam Driver feels even worse.
“My guess would be that Michael Fassbender might not be feeling so awesome today and that Adam Driver feels even worse.”
Driver? Maybe. Fassbender? I don’t think so. These emails show how much people value his talent (not only his d*ck) and I think he’s more happy for this than for any comment about his “star power”.Actually even these people (Pascal and DeLuca) are starting to ask themselves how much it’s important TODAY having a huge tabloid-movie star when films are defined by other things,among these,stunning performances.
There are definitely compliments to his talent in the discussion, but there are some not so great things there at all. It’s not just the debate between casting someone like Tom Cruise (which was a real wtf? anyway) and casting someone like Fassbender. The emails make it pretty clear that he’s a solid step below critical darlings like DiCaprio and Bale in the hierarchy of who gets parts. I’m sure Fassbender knows this already, but I suspect he’d rather be publicly perceived as being those men’s up and coming rival rather than the guy who gets the call after they both turn down the part.
I’m surprised that people who are such high level motion picture power players use extremely poor grammar in their emails. I would never ever send low class exchanges like theirs and I’m not nearly at the top of my company’s power structure. Act like you have some class people!!
ALSO – what’s with the Jobs movie stuff. Didn’t we already see a version of the Jobs biography with Aston Kutcher and it was a flop? Who needs another one?
the more power they have, the more they think they are untouchable and behaive like arogant brats. they think they own the world. especially men!
i have read many mails from angry CEO´s, i can tell you, Rudin is nothing.
CEO´s write very nice and professional when they want something from you and everything is fine, but if they dont get what they want and they write to someone they know very good and trust, they can be real A…oles! Not everones like that of course, but you would wonder how many times ive seen such mails. Ive worked as a Personal assistant for a CEO for 5 years in a huge bank.
@Granger: Yea, there really isn’t much in these emails at all. I mean, initially I was excited, then after reading everything, I realized that nothing was actually revealed about Hollywood operations. This is just basic stuff we already knew about it: there’s misogyny, back stabbing, manipulation, and ego prodding — that’s it. Nothing to get excited about. The only thing that was really revealed is just how powerful Angelina really is to have gotten Scott in such a huff and having Amy bat for her.
Scott will apologize (somehow) to Angelina (or she to him), possibly behind the scenes and that relationship will be patched up. Amy and Scott will work together again (somehow) in the near future as well. No powerful person in Hollywood really cares too much about these leaks. In fact, apologies were probably given out before these leaks were even made public.
Everything comes down to money and influence. All of the involved parties have more to gain from each other than not, so they will continue dealing with one another.
Amy isn’t going in to bat for Angelina. She agree’s with Rudin that Cleopatra is far from ready and she wants Fincher for Jobs. She wasn’t siding with Angelina, she was trying to appease Rudin by downplaying Angelina and Cleopatra, and she failed so she lost Jobs. In the end she’s literally begging him to come back.
I get what you are saying, however, Amy was still essentially going to “bat” for Angelina. She didn’t even have to try and defend (even weakly) the Cleopatra project. What it comes down to is she and Angelina are friends (as Amy and David are partners) and she was “defending” her to the best of her abilities.
I dunno what is going on but I love his words about this woman.
Is it bad that I only care for Fincher’s email? The one where he’s lying to Amy Pascal about quitting “Jobs” AND bitching about Adam Driver as a “Star Wars” villain? *in just one sentence PUH-LEASE*
I love him, I”m sure he’s the King of the Drama Queens <3
They are all crazy and insane running the insane asylum known as Hollywood. God Bless these hacks!!! they are giving us gossip gold that should last awhile.
OK, I googled Pascal and she worked for Rudin at Fox for about nine months (1986-1987). I think this explains the horrible way he treats her in these emails.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/gallery/scott-rudins-top-alums-look-696919#2-amy-pascal
She is a “celebrity and camp event” with marginal [acting] talent. ” This is really another way of saying OVER-EXPOSED … the public may like what she does as a human being…but she is an overrated actress so I enjoyed the comment for saying it how it is as far as her acting goes.
honey, who isnt overexposed in Hollywood or overrated or overpaid? look at their paychecks. its insane.
Aniston is the best example for the Hollywoodmachine too 😉 who are we kidding?
Both of them profited from this neverending triangle. You know what guys say when you ask them about the triangle? They say, Brad is the winner, he had them both 😉
I like Angelina and im her fan for almost 20 years now but i would never say shes the best actress. shes fine but mediocre in acting. but thats not her power, its her charisma.
i know lots of people who dont have talent in their jobs, but they get through it with their personality. Angie has Starpower. Thats more important then anything, especially for women in Hollywood. How many really good movies do we have where the main figure is a woman? How far can you get when your “only” a good actress? you can be happy if you get a role where you can play the wife of Clooney or Hanks. if you want to see really good actors, go to the broadways, watch a shaksepear play, there you will find true actors.
“honey, who isnt overexposed in Hollywood or overrated or overpaid?”
people with real actual talent obvs
Poor Scotty, I guess someone didn’t piss in his cornflakes and he was sad and droopy.
I hope Universal sends him a big ole smoochie bouquet of pansies for all the publicity he will bring to Angie and Unbroken.
Well done Pugsley.
Minimally talented spoiled brat….
Here we can see how powerfull man, react to powerfull confident woman.
i work in a big bank. i can tell you, men can be really mean behind closed doors when it comes to woman in an equal high position. the judgement is unfair and sexist, they can behaive like little boys who feel threaten by a girl who could take their toys away from them. its ridiculous.
unfortunately, this is one reason why lots of women have no desire to take higher positions at work. the judgement to women is mostly unfair and they will be more critisiced for their power and confidence then men. or for their mistakes.
Reading about this Scott Rudin, I am not surprised by his comments. He sounds like he is a 2 year old having a tantrum. Being voted such a horrible boss, being cruel to employees doesn’t help him either.
Angelina isn’t perfect, she knows that but she always is moving forward. She, so far, hasn’t said an unkind word about anyone. Don’t expect her to start. Btw, another Sony producer just called Keven Hart a wh.ore. Wow, I like Angelina and Kevin Hart. Rudin and Clint Culpepper should have their lives on display for all to examine their ugly souls.
I cannot wait to see ‘Unbroken’.
im not american, what does camp event mean? can someone explain?
cheesy, lacking in substance, posing in an exaggerated manner.
Thank you 🙂
The leg.
“The leg.”
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
A+++++++++++
I’m not the least bit surprised at the vitriol and arrogance in these emails. Understand that these people thrive on confrontations like this–or worse. It isn’t wearying or overwhelming to them, it’s mother’s milk! They enjoy the buzz and the adrenalin kick. And it’s even better when they can win on a petty point and make somebody eat sh!t. This is exactly what it’s like to roll with the big boys. No fragile flowers need apply.
1- I am shocked they got hacked and so much personal info was made public
2- The e-mails are juicy
3- Rudin had the most direct, ruthless and unecessary way of telling like it is… He was actually the only one who had analyzed the reasons things should move forward or not
4- The a*s kissing e-mail to Leo was vomit-inducing
5- The comment about Fassbender private “talent” was “hey girlish”
6- The powerpoint slides… What an amateur job .What were they thinking?!
7- How did Amy Pascal become the co-chair of Sony with such doormat behavior, terrible grammar and inability to make decisions? My Lord…
8- I am borrowing “incept” and “camp event”
OMG These egomaniacs,disconnected from any type of reality..
That email to leverage Leo’s Oscars thirst is gold.. 🙂
I must say that I’m “pleased” that some of these peope (email Pascal-DeLuca about Jobs and the fassbender casting) start to question the indisputable necessity of “tabloid selling\movie stars” to guarantee a movie’s success.. Big-stars don’t necessarily sell tickets today.. no more. Even Angelina Jolie.. As a fan I’m happy to see people recognize talent where there’s actually some talent to recognize. Rudin was right about Cleopatra,he comes out like a huge ass*ole who was being mad at her messing up his plans,but at the same time I don’t doubt that Angelina can be pretty egotistical,self-centered too.. even if in this case Pascal was just using her like an excuse not to pay Fincher.
this is not a man vs. a women thing. rudin would have made the same angry comments if it was a male actor who wanted to do a Hercules movie
Is this “hack”, less than two weeks before ‘Unbroken’ has its premiere strange? Has anyone considered it might not be a hack but perhaps is intentional? I’m not trying to start a rumor mill, but let’s face it, the folks in Hollywood are ruthless. And it could be that someone wants to taint her as she (obviously) campaigns for an Oscar nod in the director category.
I find it funny that everyone is taken by the rest of it, without viewing the bigger picture here.
If it’s North Korea, then it’s times for the release of The Interview. She’s just a casualty.
These aren’t great times for the Jolie-Pitts. First the smoking/’fighting’ pics, then the poor reviews & no noms for Unbroken, now this, which any way you spin it, doesn’t make her look good. Her movie had better do well at the box office or earn some Oscar love.
(I call a pap-friendly family outing to that toy store in NYC in 3…2…1….)
I guess all this is making your day. 🙂
Not really, but it is good gossip…
Now now, let G&T enjoy herself. Between Aniston’s ex marrying her nemesis, her boyfriend waffling on their engagement, and her movies flopping and bombing, her fans haven’t had a lot to celebrate over the past year.
Sure Cheyenne, whatever you say….
Maybe this was the reason they were fighting on the balcony to begin with. The emails aren’t too disconnected from the Australian film event/Jolie’s appearance in Australia.
Is Angelina supposed to PLAY cleopatra??? She will get loads of backlash for that because – HELLO? – Cleopatra was BLACK and Angelina has already played a black woman who should have been played by a woman of color. It would be extremely ignorant of her to play Cleopatra.
1) Angelina was chosen by Mariane Pearl to play her in “A Mighty Heart”
2) There is no proof whatever that Cleopatra was black. We don’t know what color she was. We do know she was descended from the Ptolemies and the Ptolemies had a habit of marrying their relatives to keep the bloodline pure. She may have had some African blood but this is by no means certain.
Cleopatra was not black, but a european. She was a Greek (from the Ptolemy line).
Can you imagine how angelina jolie gets her ass kissed ??? I bet we can’t even begin to fathom it ! It would be hard not to get some kind of a big ego over it ! And throw in her great looks which alone would get her special treatment…girl has got it made. I’m sure she is very gracious and sweet, she can afford to be cuz people treat her wonderfully for the most part. But I have. NO problem believing she can br a spoiled brat if she doesn’t get her way. No problem at all !
“Can you imagine how angelina jolie gets her ass kissed”
Judging from that e-mail DiCaprio got from his agent, no I really cannot even fathom it.
I suppose it is only natural to develop a huge ego and self-delusion if this kind of ass-kissing is all you ever get all day long, all the time.
S.R. acted UNPROFESSIONALLY & in an UNCIVILIZED manner. In front of AJ, he’s all praises BUT behind her back he’s the opposite. He should have confronted her and told his issues with her. He holds a high position, he should behave in a manner that people would respect him. You know, RESPECT is earned. I think, he acted LIKE A BABY….CRYING FOR A CANDY!!! It’s very UNBECOMING of him. And you know what I think on how AJ would respond, a DEAFENING SILENCE!!!
Well, what that man S.R. did… only made himself UNTRUSTWORTHY in the eyes of other celebrities & to other people he may have a professional or personal dealings with in the future. They will question his honesty. His word. People will doubt his actions. He created a monster out of himself.
So what if AJ would not be able to work with him. Who is he anyway?! I don’t even know him. I just read his name in the past because AJ’s name was attached. Now, we are talking about him because of AJ.
IT’S HIS LOST, and definitely NOT AJ’s. AJ has credibility. He has none based on his past actuations to his staff etc.
It’s good that AJ just didn’t give in to what he wants. It only shows AJ cannot just be dictated. She is not a robot. She may compromise coz she listens BUT never dictate on her. Remember, AJ is the biggest star in Hollywood. She is NOT just an ordinary actress, she is a thinking celebrity as well. She has power… she has the clout. She can call anyone that matters.
Now, S.R. included himself to the list of people who tried to put a very good woman down…. well, sooner or later the principle of moral causation popularly known as KARMA will be catching up with him. His intent & actions will influence his future.
Just look at the lives now of J.A., C.H. and others who wronged AJ….. while AJ’s life is blessed with good Karma.
YIKES
LMFAO!!! Right? Some of these melt-downs are literally making my hour. The spin doctors are officially out. 🙂 it couldn’t possibly be that Angelina is a control freak with a narcissistic personality disorder! Because, logic. It makes more sense that she’s so great, so wonderful and so very perfect that everyone who disagrees is jealous or sexist or possibly a serial killer. Lol! So golden it hurts…
I agree with Scott. I like Angelina and Brad, but basically, their films are popular because they’re attractive. Both are okay actors, but with a decent script, beauty and sex always sells. I’d choose a Meryl Streep, Helen Mirren, Angela Bassett, Viola Davis, or a Judy Dench movie over a Angelina Jolie movie any day of the week, even it I’ve already seen the movie. Elizabeth Taylor played Cleo a long time ago, and it was laughable. Angelina may want to rethink this movie.
He can call her whatever he wants, but she’s on the world’s stage doing good things. She has greater priorities than just acting.
Angelina Jolie is the daughter of Jon Voight (who is rich and many years ago in an interview has said that people with no health insurance should die if they couldn’t pay their insurance) she used his money and fame to become an actor. She became an actor and because of her stunning beauty and her sexuality became really famous…then she got Brad Pitt America’s most famous actor-celebrity and then she got America to love her as a saint and as a queen ..i dont get it!!! Why Americans can’t see that she is one of the most hypocrite people of the world??? All this humanitarian job she does is BS because on the other hand she supports all these reasons that brings peoples to be poor and homeless and refugees ..the only result of all her work is: her getting richer and even more famous and these are the only motives of her acts even in her movies! And let’s say the truth she is not such a good actor (with only exeption her role in Girl interrupted).
If nothing else, it should be abundantly clear why AJ talks about quitting acting.
today must have been a good day to wake up as Jennifer Aniston huh? This AND a SAG nomination. #TEAMRUDIN Let’s make it a trend.
I have to say that this post, and comments, have made a very interesting read. In my opinion Mr Rudin comes across as an infantile egomaniac. So am I to believe that a grown man and well respected director like David Fincher, doesn’t have the ability to decide for himself what projects he wants to direct? This is ridiculous. If David Fincher wanted to direct Jobs then he would have. What did Angelina do; tell him she would spank him and send him to bed without his dinner if he didn’t wait for Cleopatra? Mr Rudin holding Angelina responsible is moronic. I’m sure Mr Fincher can stand on his own two feet and make his own decisions.
This is hilarious.
I loved AJ back when she was a total loon. I really admire her honesty and frankness and obviously her humanitarian work is incredible.
In terms of her acting, she’s not terribly inspiring to me. I think there are plenty of better actresses, but she does what she does well, namely guttural sobbing, melancholic moaning with some aggressive, sexy, craziness thrown in. It can get a little boring.
Watch this space!
testing
Okay the amount of people, although not the majority, siding with Rudin is troublesome. First the fact that he may be correct about Cleopatra being a colossal waste of money and resources is really irrelevant. Jolie no matter what you think of her talent is a bankable movie star. She is interested in making Cleopatra, has a script draft for lack of a better word from a writer she likes and has David Fincher interested in directing. Fincher has a great reputation in Hollywood for his work, but he is fickle when it comes to projects. He was originally directing Blue Dahlia, Mission Impossible III, Spiderman, Catch me If you Can, Batman Begins and 8MM just to name the few on his IMBD page, sure there are more. He dropped out. He may have been interested in both the Jobs and Cleopatra movie but until he signs and actually shows up I wouldn’t hold my breath. He controls his projects and all in Hollywood know that.
Pascal really just wanted Rudin to not piss off a bankable movie star in Jolie as she saw a time conflict which probably didn’t really exist. Rudin refused to do what Hollywood does, but he expects Pascal to bow to him. Then he goes and insults one of the wealthiest and best funded producers in Hollywood in billionaire Megan Ellison. Smart move, he looks like a misogynistic pig.
Not to mention now the entertainment magazines are saying he has gone through 250 assistants, mostly women in the last five years, and he corrects them to say it is just a little over 100. Much better!!! Rudin could really have a hard time after this, and frankly he deserves it. I for one think both ideas are kind of blah and hope Michael Fassbender drops out.
Angierexia Phonie gets hers
haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
I watched “Girl, Interrupted” with her in it, and thought it was an okay film. I don’t think she is a great actress, either; that’s just the hype. She and Pitt are just constantly putting themselves in the news for whatever reason.
Shonda Rhimes just had the last word on Scott Rudin: “You can put a cherry on a pile of sh*t, but that don’t make it a sundae.”
Excellent remark -love it…can put a cherry on these Po’ holocausted parasites, but their still EVIL and care nothing about the dumb Goyim/gentiles (Non-jews).