Aspiring Starlets and the American Sleaze Machine
by John Lawrence
For some women Hollywood moguls are sexual predators. For others they are a potential way of becoming a star, a means to an end. There are those that are repulsed by the casting couch as well they should be. It is just the first step, an entree of sorts, into an industry that is characterized by sleaze. So it is altogether fitting that the first introduction to the industry is a sleazy encounter with the likes of Harvey Weinstein. After all if your goal is to purvey sleaze, why not immerse yourself in the real life sleaze that goes on behind the scenes?
For other women a rejection of the casting couch means that they will probably never make it in the sleazy movie industry. They should rejoice in that fact alone because then they might have a chance to lead a more healthy, productive and ethical life.
The first movie that Harvey Weinstein fully financed was Pulp Fiction. Its script was reportedly turned down by Columbia TriStar as "too demented". Miramax co-chairman Harvey Weinstein was instantly enthralled with it. The film is about criminality, drugs and murder, a wonderful combination that is what aspiring starlets who make the cut will be involved in. The entertainment industry is inherently sleazy. Pulp Fiction won a lot of awards; it was considered a great movie. Nevertheless, it characterized the vacuity and emptiness of unproductive lives involved in borderline and in some cases outright criminality. This is what women, who want to become known in that industry and who will do anything to attain their goal, including accepting the advances of Harvey Weinstein and others like him, aspire to.
Some who accept mogul advances and then never become big stars have a case of sour grapes and later decide that they were taken advantage of. Some of these "come forward" with accusations many years later after having a change of heart regarding that encounter which was a potential entree into the movie business. The ethical ones reject mogul advances in the first place and make the decision that it isn't worth it even if that means they are throwing away their chances at becoming a star.
What is purveyed onscreen in many but not all cases is a twisted, illicit sexuality which evidently is more entertaining than sex which is portrayed as part of a love affair. I have no problem with sex as an inherent part of a love story between two consenting married or unmarried adults. But this kind of sexuality is not the kind that sells most movies. This is the kind that brands a movie as a "chick flick" or a European movie which is too dull for most American audiences. American audiences want cultural depravity and this is what producers like Harvey Weinstein know will sell.
The bottom line is that women shouldn't be too outraged when the vicarious sleaze portrayed on the Big Screen turns out to be the reality of real life in an industry in which fantasy and reality merge. You can only realistically commit to portraying sleaze if you are fully committed to it in real life. You have to live what you then can realistically portray. It's called method acting, the Stanislavski system. Women with a moral or ethical bone in their body should expect to be part of movie moguls' real life, reject it and go on to something better. They might not then become famous though. Too bad. They will just have to live with that.
