Film production company The Weinstein Company has had some of its most challenging moments in recent weeks after its founder, Harvey Weinstein, was accused of several allegations of sexual assault, a situation that became only more scandalous as dozens more women came forward with their own accounts of abuse. While the company was quick to dismiss the 65-year-old, it was later revealed by at least sixteen current and ex-executives that many people in the company knew of Weinstein's behaviour, yet The Weinstein Company only fired him after the news went public. The future of the company is uncertain, especially after Hollywood actor Channing Tatum has joined something that is beginning to look like a movement of professionals revolting against the company, refusing to work with them from now on. The 37-year-old is most widely known for his acting and dancing performances in film, but is also passionate about gender equality and being a male role model. Tatum is married to Jenna Dewan, and the two have a 4-year-old daughter together named Evelyn. Yesterday, the star announced that his latest endeavour – Tatum's first directorial role in film – would no longer be developed, given that it was being produced by The Weinstein Company. [[instagramwidget||https://www.instagram.com/p/BaZa5_HB4WD/?taken-by=channingtatum]] "The brave women who had the courage to stand up and speak their truth about Harvey Weinstein are true heroes to us," Channing wrote in an Instagram post yesterday. "They are lifting the heavy bricks to build the equitable world we all deserve to live in." "Our lone project in development with TWC – Matthew Quick’s brilliant book, Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock – is a story about a boy whose life was torn asunder by sexual abuse. "While we will no longer develop it or anything else that is the property of TWC, we are reminded of its powerful message of healing in the wake of tragedy. This is a giant opportunity for real change that we proudly commit ourselves to. "The truth is out – let’s finish what our incredible colleagues started and eliminate abuse from our creative culture once and for all. Chan and Reid." Tatum's decision is particularly prudent due to the source material of the film. The 2013 book, Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock is about a high schooler who plans a murder-suicide targeting his onetime best friend. The protagonist comes from a troubled home, and this and an account of sexual assault have had their toll on the teenager. The statement was signed off by Tatum and his production partner, Reid Carolin. The movie, which was set up by The Weinstein Company in 2014, would have been the co-directorial debut of Tatum and Carolin. Tatum also said they were committing to change by refusing to work on "anything else that is the property of TWC", making a bold statement that could likely have a detrimental effect on the company if enough people take the same stand as Tatum. It's the latest move that shows professionals making a profound statement by cancelling projects or donating funds that were associated with Weinstein. Last week, a David O Russell TV project starring Robert DeNiro and Julianne Moore was cancelled after Amazon Studios announced that they were cutting ties with The Weinstein Company. Even Democratic politicians like Hillary Clinton, Chuck Schumer, and Kristen Gillibrand have revolted by saying they'll donate campaign funds they received from Weinstein to charity. These actions, including Tatum's announcement, demonstrate how those in the industry who have not been victims of sexual abuse can still help to challenge the system by refusing to be associated with abusers, and those who are complicit in staying quiet. It was this system that forced people who were sexually assaulted to silently live with their traumatic experiences for so long. And hopefully, now, we can begin to effect change.

When the allegations of rape, sexual assault and harassment directed at film producer Harvey Weinstein started to come in this month, it was a lot to take in at once. He was fired as chairman of The Weinstein Company and expelled from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, but the news didn't end there. By this point, more than 40 women have accused him of misconduct of various degrees, including Rose McGowan, Cara Delevinge, Gwyneth Paltrow and Angelina Jolie. In the subsequent days, we have heard more and more men and women come forward about the mistreatment they have faced within the industry, from Reese Witherspoon to Terry Crews. [[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/IAMLenaHeadey/status/918465389927043072]] The latest addition to this unfortunately long list of victims is Lena Headey, who has alleged that her meetings with Weinstein in the past were horrible ordeals. The Game of Thrones star posted the story as a series of images on Twitter, describing her account of when she encountered the maligned film producer in a hotel. The first time they met was at The Venice Film Festival, where The Brothers Grimm was showing. Headey says that the producer asked her to go down to the water for a conversation, but eventually made a "suggestive comment" and a "gesture" which "genuinely shocked" her. After she laughed it off as a joke, Lena remarked that she was "was never in any other Miramax film". [[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/IAMLenaHeadey/status/920309494143504384]] She claims that the time Weinstein invited her to breakfast while she was visiting Los Angeles ended up far worse: "I had always carried the thought that he'd never try anything with me again, not after I'd laughed and said never in a million years. I believed that he respected my boundary and maybe he wanted to talk about potential work. "He asked me to meet for breakfast. We ate breakfast, we talked about films, filmmaking. He asked me a few questions about the state of my love life. I shifted the conversation back to something less personal." "Then he went to the loo. He came back and said, 'Let's go up to the room, I want to give you a script.' We walked to the lift and the energy shifted, my whole body went into high alert, the lift was going up and I said to Harvey, 'I'm not interested in anything other than work. Please don't think I got in here with you for any other reason, nothing is going to happen.'" Eventually, she plucked up the courage to nip any potential misunderstanding at its root, before anything further happened. "I don't know what possessed me to speak out at that moment," she wrote, "only that I had such a strong sense of 'don't come near me'". She continues: "He was silent after I spoke, furious." "We got out of the lift and walked to his room. His hand was on my back, he was marching me forward, not a word, I felt completely powerless, he tried his key card and it didn't work, then he got really angry." "He walked me back to the lift, through the hotel to the valet, by grabbing and holding tightly to the back of my arm, he paid for my car and whispered in my ear: "'Don't tell anyone about this, not your manager, not your agent.'" "I got into my car and I cried." [[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/IAMLenaHeadey/status/920309569074679808]] Leadey's allegation is bad enough on its own, but with more and more stories like it making the news, the reality behind Weinstein's public persona is being shown to be far more monstrous than we knew. On a positive note, it has spurred a plethora of people within the industry to speak up about his actions, the actions of other sexual predators, and the culture that allowed it to happen. Hopefully, this will spark some change within the movie business.

Ever since the allegations leveled against Harvey Weinstein came to light last year, the news hasn't stopped coming with regards to sexual misconduct in the film industry. We have seen a range of famous actors be accused of multiple counts of assault and harassment, and victims finding the courage to speak up and bring the truth to light.

There was the #MeToo hashtag that allowed women across the world to share their stories and support each other, while the widely-publicised #TimesUp campaign sought to create real change with regards to how victims of sexual misconduct are treated.

[[instagramwidget||https://www.instagram.com/p/BdaYr1jgecI/]]

Jennifer Lawrence has often been asked about the movement and the situations women may find themselves in when trying to make it in Hollywood. This is partly because she's one of the most famous actresses in the world, but also because she was the victim of the 2014 photo leaks, in which nearly 500 private photos of celebrities (mostly women) were stolen from the cloud and posted online.

Lawrence recently opened up to Oprah Winfrey about having her sensitive photos leaked. "I have such a fear with my phone and my computer and electronics,” she revealed in the interview. "It's taking somebody's intellectual property but also my body. It was violating on a sexual level."

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/20CenturyFoxUK/status/965663932730966016/]]

Now, the conversation has returned for a variety of reasons. For one, Lawrence's latest film Red Sparrow deals directly with issues of gender inequality. In the movie, she lays a Russian ballerina-turned-spy who is forced to use her body as a weapon, seducing and manipulating a CIA agent for her bosses.

On top of this, there was a recent debate over a publicity photo in which Lawrence was seen wearing a Versace dress in the freezing cold, while her male co-stars wore winter clothing. The actress later weighed in to clear things up, saying that it was her choice and she found the backlash "offensive".

[[twitterwidget||https://twitter.com/helenlewis/status/965932704310185985]]

This likely sparked the discussion point returning in a recent interview with CNN, in which she was asked about the mistreatment of women in Hollywood. Lawrence explained:

"When I hear the harrowing stories of Harvey Weinstein's victims, I don't feel right putting myself in that exact category. I was certainly mistreated. I was definitely treated in a way that now we would call abusive.

“I had to deal with being young and I had to put up with executives or higher-ups putting their hands on my legs and not feeling like I could say, ‘Please don’t do that’".

She then went on to point out that we need to change how we talk about victims of abusive behavior such as this, and believe the women who have the courage to come forward:

“97 per cent of sexual abuse allegations are true – there’s the three per cent that isn’t. I feel, over the past, we’ve focused on the three per cent and it’s been so easy to say, ‘Oh, she’s lying.’

"If we create a community where survivors can come forward and talk, then there’s going to be change and there’s going to be no way of going backwards.”

Speaking on a more personal level with regards to the 2014 hacks, Lawrence recently opened up about how the nude photos being posted online affected her relationships.

On October 5th, the New York Times published a list of allegations against film producer Harvey Weinstein - an action which would cause a snowball effect across Hollywood. Since then, further accusers have spoken out against Weinstein, with Rose McGowan being the first to publicly accuse the producer of rape. Dozens of actresses and Hollywood personalities took to Twitter to share their own experiences (starting the '#metoo' trend), which eventually led to other prominent names being implicated. Charlie Sheen, Ed Westwick, Kevin Spacey, Sylvester Stallone and Louis CK are just some of the individuals to have been accused of assault or harassment in the wake of Weinstein's exposure, and there's every possibility that another famous figure could be outed at any time. While that's been happening, though, even more allegations about Weinstein's horrendous actions have come to light. A 'secret hitlist' purportedly containing over 90 names of people targeted by Weinstein has been uncovered by The Observer this week. The people on the list are either individuals that had been directly mistreated by the producer, or those who potentially knew enough about the abuse to be a threat to him. In total, the list contains 91 people - all of whom are either actors, publicists, producers, financiers or others working in the film industry. Weinstein's plan was to hire investigators to target those on the list and gather information about what they knew, presumably either to prepare a legal defense against it, or to bribe them into staying quiet. The document is shown to have been written up in January this year, long before news of the scandal broke. Many people consider this as evidence that Weinstein's behavior was actually rather well-known in Hollywood, and that action could (and should) have been taken against him long ago. Most of those on the list are based in the US, but there are at least 10 people from London - one of whom being Sophie Dix, who said her career prospects were “massively cut down” after she accused Weinstein of sexual assault in a hotel. Of the 43 men and 48 women listed, many are people who have already come forward, and so law enforcement has color-coded those who are to be prioritized during the investigation process. People whose names are written in red are individuals that Weinstein was most intent on targeting, so it is likely that their testimonies against him will be most damning. Though more than 50 women have already come forward with accusations of rape, harassment, and inappropriate behavior against Weinstein, the producer still denies any wrongdoing. In addition to claiming there were no "non-consensual" relations between Weinstein and any of the alleged victims, a spokesperson released a statement giving Weinstein's official response to the notion that he hired investigators to spy on potential accusers. “It is a fiction to suggest that any individuals were targeted or suppressed at any time,” he said. Despite this, evidence shows that Weinstein made at least eight settlements with various women over the last three decades. Anonymous sources have revealed that, of the charges which were leveled against him, at least two cases were for sexual harassment and unwanted physical contact. A criminal investigation is ongoing.  

Earlier this week, The New York times published an explosive investigation into the hidden history of sexual harassment by movie mogul Harvey Weinstein. The expose revealed that the 65-year-old Hollywood producer was accused of multiple counts of sexual assault, as claimed by a number of female actresses he worked with over three decades of his career. Since the article was published, a handful more alleged victims have come forward with their own stories. Just yesterday, The New York Times published another article naming the other women coming forward to speak out against Weinstein, including uber-actresses Gwyneth Paltrow and Angelina Jolie. Paltrow revealed in a new interview that when she was just 22, she was hired by Weinstein for the lead role in the Jane Austen film adaptation of Emma. The now 45-year-old told how before shooting began, Weinstein invited her to his hotel suite for a business meeting. When they finished working, Weinstein allegedly placed his hands on her and suggested they move to the bedroom for "massages".

Paltrow said she refused his come-on, feeling stunned and adding how she felt vulnerable and worried about her fledgling career at the time: “I was a kid, I was signed up, I was petrified.”

After the hotel room incident, 22-year-old Paltrow confided in her boyfriend at the time, Brad Pitt. After hearing about the harassment to his girlfriend, Pitt told the New York Times through a representative that he approached Weinstein at a movie event and told him never to touch her again. Another source told People about what happened: “Brad threatened Harvey. He got right in his face, poked him in the chest and said, ‘You will not ever do this to Gwyneth ever again'.” It was a risky move for Pitt, who was only a burgeoning actor himself. But he wanted to take a stand against the powerful Hollywood producer, the source saying that Pitt “made it clear there would be consequences” if Weinstein made a move again, and “described it as giving Harvey a ‘Missouri whooping.'” Missouri is where Pitt grew up, for those who didn't know. In response, the source said that Weinstein tried to explain at first, but "then he stopped and listened and got the message." After the confrontation, Weinstein warned the young actress not to tell anyone else about his advances. “I thought he was going to fire me,” Paltrow said. Weinstein supposedly phoned Paltrow and blasted her for talking about what happened. “He screamed at me for a long time,” she said, “It was brutal.” Despite the harassment during Emma, Paltrow went on to work with Weinstein on other films over the years, including the Weinstein-produced Shakespeare in Love, for which she won an Oscar. In the same article, Jolie revealed that she worked with Weinstein in the late 1990s when starring in Playing by Heart, and that she also rejected unwanted advances he made on her in a hotel room.

“I had a bad experience with Harvey Weinstein in my youth, and as a result, chose never to work with him again and warn others when they did,” Jolie said in an email to the New York Times.

It makes you wonder though, that surely in her 12-year relationship with Pitt, Jolie probably confided in him as well. While Pitt valiantly defended then-girlfriend Paltrow at the time of her assault, it shows how complicit many people have been regarding Weinstein's behaviour.

It's been said that many people in the industry knew of Weinstein's behaviour, yet stayed silent about it for years. Sixteen former and current executives at The Weinstein Company have recently come forward to testify that they knew of his predatory behaviour, although he was only fired after the news was published in the mass media this week.

When film producer Emily Best found out, she said she was not surprised. “The industry at large,” she said, “provided shelter for his bad behaviour directly and indirectly” by staying silent.

Still, Weinstein has been fired, the man is receiving a severe (albeit delayed) public shaming, AND his wife has finally said she's leaving him, quickly. He had it coming.