Out of the Woods

At long last, is it finally Woody Allen’s moment in The Reckoning? A tiny trickle has become a steady stream of actors who have worked with the filmmaker in the past and are now denouncing, and apologizing, for their involvement with him.

They include Ellen Page, wonderful and brave Ellen Page, who posted in November about her own experiences with sexual harassment and called working with Allen “the biggest regret of my career.” Then this week alone there was Greta Gerwig, Mira Sorvino and Rebecca Hall. Lest you think it’s only ladies, two men have also stepped up – actors Griffin Newman, David Krumholtz, and Timothée Chalamet.

This matters, this really does, and I truly hope more actors and actresses who I admire and respect greatly, but have worked with Allen in the past step up. (Please, Cate, please please please, Cate.) We need them. Plus we need a lot more dudes to start stepping up, too.

If you want to familiarize yourself with why we need all their voices please refer to the two open letters Allen’s daughter, Dylan Farrow, has written about her father’s sexual abuse of her as a child. The first was in 2014, which brought the long-simmering allegations of abuse back to the vivid and horrifying forefront. Then she wrote an op-ed just last month wondering aloud why The Reckoning had not touched her abuser yet.

Her accounts of what he did to her have not changed. Not for decades. What has appeared to have changed is the public acceptance of the industry’s lame excuse that this was a purely “family dispute” not to be waded into out of a false sense of decorum.

I hope the full force of The Reckoning finally sweeps Allen, and all of his ilk, into the murky depths where they belong – never to heard from or lauded again. And if, by chance, you don’t think speakingout after the fact means much, please refer to Dylan’s own heartfelt response. It matters. We need them, we need more of them. It matters.

There have been some brave and bold women who have taken a stand with and for me in the past few days. I want to acknowledge their integrity, their courage, and their exemplification of a new way forward. Thank you, it means the world. #TIMESUP

— Dylan Farrow (@realdylanfarrow) January 13, 2018