Refresh for more…At a 78th Cannes Film Festival that’s attempting to course correct being complicit in #MeToo, down over by the Carlton Beach, a festivity tonight was more forgiving: The Better World Fund Gala handed out its Award for Excellence in Film and Television to 2x Oscar winner Kevin Spacey.
While Spacey was accused of several allegations of sexual misconduct, he was found not liable in 2022 New York lawsuit, and he was acquitted by a jury of sexual assault charges in a 2023 London court. Still the American Beauty Best Actor Oscar winner hasn’t been invited back to any major studio Hollywood production, now making his bread on myriad indie foreign sales funded feature projects.
“I’d like to congratulate Emmanuel for the decision to invite me here tonight to accept this award,” said The Usual Suspects actor, “Who would have ever thought that honoring someone who has been exonerated in every court room he’s ever walked into would be thought of as a brave idea. But here we are.”
“I’ve been thinking of someone else you saw earlier on the screen tonight, Kirk Douglas, great American film star. It was a long, long time ago, but we have to think about the pushback that he received after he made the brave decision to stand up for fellow colleague, 2x Oscar winning screenwriter, Dalton Trumbo, who had been blacklisted from 1947-1960, he was blacklisted. Blacklisted, we know what that mean? He couldn’t find work in Hollywood for 13 years. But even after he was warned if he tried to hire Trumbo as the credited screenwriter for Spartacus in 1960, he’d be called a Commie lover, and his career and professional status would be canceled, Kirk Douglas took the risk, and would later say, and I won’t do my Kirk Douglas impression, but he said this, ‘It’s easier for us actors to play the heroes on screen. We get to fight the bad guys and stand up for justice. But in real life, the choices are not always so clear. There are times when one has to stand up for principal.’”
“I’ve learned a lot from history — it often repeats itself,” said The House of Cards thespian, “The Blacklist was a terrible time in our history so that it never happens again.”
“Kirk Douglas spoke those words in 2014 when he was 98 years old. Of course, people know about Dalton Trumbo and the Hollywood 10, but I suspect very few of you know or ever heard of the 475 other industry professionals whose lives were destroyed by false allegations during that lengthy dark period. And today we find ourselves once again at the intersection of uncertainty and fear in the film business and beyond….
