The Sony E-mail Hack -- Drama Queens

[Totenkindly]

After the movie hacks, now the hackers are releasing chains of e-mails from well-known producers and studio execs. Today's drama consists mainly of stuff between well-known producer Scott Rudin and Sony big-wig exec Amy Pascal. Despite the amount of money these people deal with, this might as well be forum drama at its finest/worst.

“A $180 million ego bath”: All the Hollywood stereotypes the leaked Sony emails confirm - Salon.com

https://www.yahoo.com/movies/producer-trashes-angelina-jolie-and-more-from-104860916897.html

Leaked: The Nightmare Email Drama Behind Sony's Steve Jobs Disaster

My response when I read it is a mix -- amusement, disgust, indifference. I mean, does anyone seriously believe that people who are accomplished in this field would survive and achieve anything without having large egos and acting aggressively to throw their weight around?

Does anyone have such a rose-colored view of reality that these types of conversations seem shocking in any way? It's more that we're just finally seeing the dirty laundry that we could already assume they were strewing around.

I think the comments about Fassbender are amusing. Sorkin doesn't even know who he is. WTF? It was also amusing seeing some agent/rep just about get down on his knees in front of Leonardo DiCaprio and pucker up in order to try to convince him to do the Jobs movie. Just... seriously? No wonder actors have big egos or feel like they are entitled to things.

 

[Cellmold]

I had a similar reaction to you.

It's one of the reasons why I've always been wary, but curious, about the kinds of drives and ego indulgences involved in these arenas. In some ways it's helpful to have a big ego, it gives a person the delusional kick to push and fight for something, even if it isn't that important. A bit like how a kick of adrenaline in a dangerous situation can be rationalised after as "the will to survive" it's not true, but it is a convenient lie...just like an ego.

Sorry over focused on the ego there, but yeah I'm not too surprised by this.

 

[Totenkindly]

I had a similar reaction to you.

It's one of the reasons why I've always been wary, but curious, about the kinds of drives and ego indulgences involved in these arenas. In some ways it's helpful to have a big ego, it gives a person the delusional kick to push and fight for something, even if it isn't that important. A bit like how a kick of adrenaline in a dangerous situation can be rationalised after as "the will to survive" it's not true, but it is a convenient lie...just like an ego.

Sorry over focused on the ego there, but yeah I'm not too surprised by this.

No, that's fine.

It's just interesting -- here in the exterior world, we tend to focus on the actual outcome... the performances, the overall impact of the picture, the story, the feelings it generates. We talk about performance as brave, shallow, expansive, boring. So much is focused on the actors. It's easy to forget how much crap goes on just to even get the "team" together (all the workers, the studio backing, the money, the actors, the director, etc.)... how much jockeying, how many under-the-table deals, how much bitching and moaning and capitulating and manipulating. It's a much dirtier uglier business than many people realize, and sometimes it makes you wonder how a particularly good movie can ever come about or how new actors with talent actually manage to get their foot in the door. Also, when a lot of blame gets dumped on a director or writer or actor, maybe it could be understood that the failure of a movie might rest more on the producer and studio that shortchanged/strongarmed the crew and cast into a faulty vision that they personally were trying to avoid but couldn't.

 

[Totenkindly]

-- Chapter 2 --

Awkward.
Angelina Jolie Runs Into Sony's Amy Pascal After Email Leaks

And now comes all the predictable groveling. It sounds like they're even using a common template here. What's with this, "That's not who I really am" phrase? (That's gotten popular in the last decade.) Really? Actually, it just might be who you are.

If they believe what they said, then they need to stand by it... although perhaps say it in a way that doesn't come across as total douchebaggery. E-mail's not necessarily private, depending on what happens...It bugs me they said a bunch of stuff that they either believe or do personally find funny, while now trying to pretend they do not. All these prepackaged song-and-dance numbers meant to recover public face for oneself and one's associates...

Studio head, producer apologize for Jolie, Obama remarks - Yahoo News

I wonder if the Obama jokes would have been different if a standup comedian had made them, then launched into a "President Hillary" bit while listing a bunch of rom-coms she might be into (which is amusing since Hillary doesn't seem much of a rom-com'er) and then a bunch of "guy" movies that a male president would have stereotypically been into. Context can change how things are perceived.

EDIT: Wow. "Beginning the healing process"?

Pascal said one of the first calls she made today — after a leaked email exchange between her and producer Scott Rudin became the most buzzed-about topics in town and throughout the country — was to Jesse Jackson.

"It was a very preliminary conversation, and we just talked about getting together and hoping to discuss a healing process," Pascal said. Of being labeled a racist, she added, "I know it's not true. And I know that doesn't reflect who I am or what I feel or what I've done. That certainly doesn't reflect this studio and what we've done here."

Amy Pascal Calls Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson: "I Want to Accept Responsibility" - Yahoo News

I do agree with her point here and perhaps is giving more context to the buzz phrase "that's not who I am":

Pascal added: "I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy. You're being judged on things that you said in a 10-second frame that were stupid. And that's not my whole career and everything I've done. I'm concerned about that, but I'm also concerned about employees here who are being violated, and they're scared. They didn't do anything to deserve this. It's very unfair."

 

[prplchknz]

seems like some middle school drama if middle schoolers had access to large sums of money and production studios and actors

 

[PeaceBaby]

I suspect with all the human factors involved it's a miracle some movies ever get made. Those e-mails are pretty much exactly what I imagine the behind-the-scenes wrangling to be. Actually, those ones might be tame. It will be a good reminder to a lot of people that e-mail is not a secure means of communication. I imagine there is a lot of mail server clean-up going on in other corporate offices right now ...

Also, when a lot of blame gets dumped on a director or writer or actor, maybe it could be understood that the failure of a movie might rest more on the producer and studio that shortchanged/strongarmed the crew and cast into a faulty vision that they personally were trying to avoid but couldn't.

I think that's a great point.

 

[iwakar]

The comments about Angelina Jolie's $180m ego bath for the Cleopatra film had me laughing out loud.

 

[Totenkindly]

The comments about Angelina Jolie's $180m ego bath for the Cleopatra film had me laughing out loud.

It was pretty funny, aside from knowing he was gonna get blasted for saying that stuff.

Jolie's a decent actress within certain constraints -- she's one of the most legitimately "physical" female actors out there, kind of like Tom Cruise over on the male side, although I think Cruise has had far more versatile/serious roles than she has. Still, if the part is right, she can nail it (RE: Maleficent, the issues with that movie involved direction and script; Jolie did an excellent job with what she was handed).

Still, I can see the basis for some of those comments.

---

Oh, and look -- now there's a Tinder squabble unfolding in public media due to the jilted partner's lawsuit hitting the court.

Every Text from the Tinder Sexual Harassment Lawsuit

Along with e-mails, you can apparently add text messages to the list of items it's not okay to behave like a shithead with because one day everyone will read them, if they're bad enough and/or you're high-up enough.

I feel bad for the judge.
EDIT: Oh, maybe it was settled:
Whitney Wolfe Settles Sexual Harassment Tinder Lawsuit For Just Over $1 Million - Business Insider

 

[highlander]

The stories are stupid but the hack is I believe quite serious. It is more of an indictment of our modern media than anything else. No pun intended.

 

[EffEmDoubleyou]

I can't believe the hand-wringing and pearl-clutching over the content of these emails. Maybe I'm crazy, but I don't see how this is any different from what normal people might write in emails they consider private. It's embarrassing that they were revealed, but seriously, who hasn't said similar things about other people? I think it's dangerous to make broad assumptions about character from these leaks.

The part that really IS damaging is that people are going to lose jobs over this, jobs they don't deserve to lose.

 

[Totenkindly]

Veering away from the original personal drama in e-mail, there's a bunch of other stuff that is now coming up as journalists dig like rats through the data:
https://www.yahoo.com/movies/sony-hack-jennifer-lawrence-clooney-murdoch-105095908182.html

One interesting thing is that Lawrence and Adams were only originally slated for 7% take on "American Hustle".. already raised once from 5%... but all the male leads were getting 9%. So it sounds like in the end they all got the same take (?)... but sadly I think Lawrence and Adams were actually two of the best performances in the movie and the inequity should never have existed in the first place. (I would say Lawrence is a far bigger box-office draw than Cooper, to be honest -- she appeals both to men and women to an unparalleled degree IMO.)

There are some other issues in there (like Sony trying to put restraints on Google and limit the 'net), but apparently one of the first drafts of Spectre, the Bond movie opening next year, was leaked along with copious notes to fix. I refuse to read it, personally; I like to be surprised; but this kind of stuff is going to really throw a wrench into the production if the movie is basically spoilered a year in advance. They already started filming. What happens now? Throw out the script and start over? Bump the movie back two more years? Not sure what impact that will have on the movie. When these people dick over Sony, they're also dicking over fans and actors and the film crews and whoever else.

 

[prplchknz]

here's what i think of the not showing the interview. I think it probably sucked to begin with the trailer didn't make me want to see it so they're doing this and they're gonna release it later and it will make tons of money cuz people think they're bad ass doing such a thing. in short i think the first one wasn't them with producers and actors and stuff. I think the second one was them to make themselves look better

edit: proof i'm correct

On Saturday, North Korea described the American claims that it was behind the attacks as slander. It also warned of serious consequences if the United States rejects its offer of a joint investigation, said the statement carried by the state-run Korean Central News Agency, according to The Associated Press.

It quoted the unidentified spokesman as saying that any joint inquiry would prove that the North was not behind the cyberattack.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/21/w...h-us.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&smid=tw-nytimes

 

[Qre:us]

Don't mess with North Korea, motherfuckers!!!

 

[Totenkindly]

<-- bored smiley who no longer gets to see The Interview

WASHINGTON (AP) -- North Korea is experiencing widespread Internet outages. One expert says the country's online access is "totally down."

It's not immediately clear if the Internet connectivity problems were an act of retribution for a major intrusion at Sony Pictures Entertainment that the FBI last week linked to North Korea.

President Barack Obama on Friday said the U.S. government would respond but didn't say how.

The White House declined to comment Monday. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf told reporters that of the federal government responses, "some will be seen, some may not be seen..."

North Korea experiencing severe Internet outages - Yahoo News



.... Of course the movie itself is a terrible act of propoganda and misplaced aggression. It's not like the United States would be really happy if someone made movies about our president being assassinated.

Any recollection of movies like Death of a President, In the Line of Fire, JFK, The Manchurian Candidate, Lincoln, White House Down, Winter Kills, The Sum of All Fears, and 3 million other movies I don't feel like Googling right now is just a bad pipe dream and driven by patriotic nationalist hallucination.

 

[Qre:us]

This is an all-out declaration of WAR.

The future of warfare: Internet Trolling.

I knew it would come to this.

 

[Totenkindly]

This is an all-out declaration of WAR.

The future of warfare: Internet Trolling.

I knew it would come to this.

Moderator Helmet and Body Armor on. check
Banning stick locked and loaded. check
Last will and testament recorded. check
Tray table up, seat back in the full upright position. check


...we're going in.

 

[Qre:us]

^

In all seriousness, I was watching a discussion yesterday, talking about this, and one of the panel members made a good point. It's a phenomenon of having one's cultural blinders on, from both sides.

The "West" may think that it is satire (terrible one at that), and that freedom of speech, especially through artistic expression, allows one to poke fun at a dictator because such an ideology is ridiculous (and dangerous). Equivalent to that of the Danish artist's cartoons about Muhammad, which saw a grave backlash and protest.

Culturally speaking, as hair-brained as it is for us on the "outside" to wrap our heads around such an idea, in North Korea, Kim Jong Un is revered as a deified figurehead, so an attack on him, is an attack on a deeply-held ideology.

 

[Totenkindly]

My intuition is that they were going to ask her about the fact she and Jennifer Lawrence were given a smaller piece of the pot (at least at first) compared to their male costars.

Still... Like that's the most important question they could ask her? I suppose they could spar over pissing rights -- just not wanting to set a precedent with subjects controlling the interview, since typically the interviewer needs to have the liberty to challenge statements versus just being a mouthpiece -- but at the same time I'd be kind of surprised if Today wasn't just playing amateur hour and trying to milk the most obvious angles of the whole Sony debacle to start with.

https://celebrity.yahoo.com/news/today-show-boots-amy-adams-232030415.html

Amy Adams is in New York to promote the Tim Burton-directed Big Eyes, and after hosting Saturday Night Live, she stayed to do an interview segment on Today. I’m told that the attempt ended with the show pulling the segment, and left the Big Eyes star feeling sad-eyed by the way she was manhandled. All because she wasn’t comfortable answering questions about a Sony Pictures hack attack that had nothing to do with her.

I’m told that Adams stayed in New York an extra day to do the Today booking, but just before, her team was told she would be asked about the Sony attack. She came to the set, and again a producer told her she would be asked. She replied that she would prefer to avoid the subject, given this was a four-minute interview. But she was told that Today is a news organization — something that was said as they engaged in a segment about dog grooming in which a hound was having its teeth brushed — and she was told no one dictates their interviews...

Maybe I should correct that and say Today is nothing but amateur hour?

 

[prplchknz]

I think sony sent people to north korea for the interview hacks. I would not put it past them they probably have the money for such a publicity stunt

Sony reverses course, The Interview will be released in theaters on Christmas Day | Consequence of Sound

 

[Totenkindly]

Sony received far worse publicity than they received positively for this particular movie, which wasn't designed to create revenue and isn't even credited as a great movie -- there's been a lot of embarrassment over data that was released, and Sony will be a laughingstock for months if not years after this. Considering what a control freak Sony is as a company, and the loss of "face," this is not a path they would pursue.

----

Aside from the understanding that perhaps the FBI did not release all the "evidence" they have regarding North Korea's culpability here, this seems a fairly reasonable assessment from what information is pubicly available.

No, North Korea Didn’t Hack Sony - The Daily Beast

If this is the case, Sony comes off as even more stupid, dancing like brainless puppets at the end of the trollers' strings.