Chapter 446 The Price of Mistakes
Link rarely paid attention to what was happening outside during filming until his agent Sam Haskell visited him on the set on Thursday and talked about the scandal of Harvey having affairs with former assistant Rosanna Qiu and actress Rosanna Arquette.
After Rosanna Chiu exposed Harvey's scandal last week, actress Rosanna Arquette also came forward and claimed that she was sexually harassed by Harvey.
Roseanne is a second-rate actress in the circle and is also Jewish. She once played a "robber couple" with Tim Roth in "Pulp Fiction" and also performed in movies such as "The Big Blue", "No Escape" and "Top Gun".
Her sister Patricia Arquette is the wife of Nicolas Cage, and her brother David Arquette is also a film actor, playing an important supporting role in "Scream".
Rosanna Arquette told The Hollywood Reporter that she was sexually harassed by Harvey during her audition for the film "Romeo with Blood" in 1993.
Harvey invited her to the Four Seasons Hotel to discuss the script. As soon as they met, he made advances on her and asked her to sleep with him in exchange for the role.
Rosanna Arquette declined and subsequently lost the opportunity to play the leading female role.
Roseanne claimed that the incident made her feel sick and troubled by it for a long time.
After seeing the report about Qiu Luovina last week, she decided to speak out and expose the matter in order to remind women in the entertainment industry to be careful of Harvey Weinstein. If they encounter such a thing again, they should call the police immediately and use legal means to protect their rights.
At the same time, I also hope that the police can pay attention to this matter and let the bad guys be punished.
Because she has a certain degree of fame in the circle, more media began to report related news after she spoke out.
Many actresses came out in support of Roxanne and asked the police to thoroughly investigate the matter.
Harvey was anxious and tried to put out fires everywhere, but Miramax's performance had deteriorated in recent years, its influence in Hollywood had dropped significantly, and it had little connection with the judicial community.
It is not easy for him to suppress these negative news.
Harvey was busy for several days but failed to stop the outbreak of public opinion. The situation became worse and worse. The police also found Harvey for questioning and prepared to open a case for investigation.
At Bob's suggestion, Harvey took the initiative to contact Link and begged for mercy, but Link was busy filming and had no time to pay attention to the matter.
Harvey called Sam Haskell again, hoping to contact Link through him to see if there was any way to resolve the conflict.
"Link, were you the one who started the Harvey scandal?"
Sam Haskell asked.
"Last month, 'The Rock' was released. Harvey contacted the media to hype up my scandal. In response, the PR department also found some evidence against Harvey. The PR department was responsible for the rest of the matter. I seldom asked about it."
After the filming of "American Beauty" started, Link was busy discussing, filming and editing the film every day and had no time to do other things. These tasks were done by people hired by Sean Tang and Jon Gordon, and he did not interfere.
Sam Haskell did not continue to ask, and smiled, "Harvey suspected that you did it, so he came to our company to ask me for help. I said you were busy filming a movie, and I hadn't seen you for a long time, so I couldn't speak for him."
Link shook his head. Harvey had many rivals in the circle, but he was able to quickly realize that it was his doing when something happened this time. Perhaps he was feeling guilty.
After Sam left, Link called Sean Tang to ask him about the progress and whether there was a chance to send Harvey to jail.
Sean Tang said the chances were slim, because they had not found many victims so far. Some had received compensation after being subjected to unspoken rules, and some were half forced and half voluntary. In addition, they had no evidence to prove Harvey's crimes, so it would be difficult to put Harvey in jail.
However, with what is happening now, it won't be a problem to ruin Harvey's reputation.
Link thought about it and asked Sean Tang to contact Harvey through an intermediary, asking him to donate 5 million US dollars to a designated charity organization, take out 3 million to compensate the victims and make a public apology, and he would not be held accountable for the subsequent matters.
Sean Tang said it could be arranged.
Two days later, Sean Tang responded that Harvey did not agree to a public apology, and expressed his willingness to apologize privately to several victims and make compensation, but only agreed to donate 500,000.
Link asks Sean to continue negotiations and hype up Harvey's scandal.
Harvey's sex scandal was everywhere in newspapers and on television. Celebrities such as Nicolas Cage, Johnny Depp, Ben Affleck, Renée Zellweger, and Demi Moore expressed their disgust at such things in interviews, and believed that the police should have investigated earlier and given an explanation to the victims.
By the following Monday, Harvey's side relented again, agreeing to donate $1 million, compensate several victims $500,000 and apologize privately.
Link refused and gave a minimum offer: donating $3 million and paying $1 million in compensation to the victims. This was the final offer and the last conversation.
Under pressure from public opinion, Harvey had to agree, and later donated 3 million US dollars to the United Nations Women's Fund, the International Red Cross, and organizations to prevent and control sexual harassment. He also made secondary compensation to several victims under the arrangement of his lawyer and apologized face to face.
After Harvey donated money, media opinion gradually changed.
Many media reported the news that Harvey donated to the Women's Fund, saying that Harvey used this method to show that he is also a feminist and would never do anything to infringe on women's rights.
There are also rumors that Harvey was suppressed by a big shot and forced to donate to a women's protection organization. If he did not donate, he would be ruined.
"Damn it Link! I swear, I will never let you go."
Harvey yelled angrily in the office.
Although he is worth tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of dollars, $4 million in cash is not a small sum for him. With this money, he can invest in another movie, or buy a mansion, a luxury yacht, collect a few luxury sports cars, or keep a few lovers.
But now it’s gone, as if it was thrown into the sea, without even a wave.
Harvey was so furious at the thought of this that he swung his golf club and smashed the office to pieces.
Bob Weinstein stood at the door of the office for a while, and when he heard the room quiet down, he pushed the door open and walked in.
After venting his anger, Harvey sat on the ground and gasped for breath. His white shirt was stained with oil and sweat and turned yellow-brown.
"Harvey, redecorating the office also requires money, you should pay attention to that."
Bob reminded.
"Shut up!"
Harvey glared at him angrily, "You are my brother. You should be as angry as I am when you see me being blackmailed, instead of standing here and laughing at my joke."
"Harvey, I warned you a long time ago that you should be careful with women. Even if you use unspoken rules, don't go too far. You should pay attention to handling the beginning and the end well. But you never listened to my advice." Bob shrugged his fat shoulders and said.
"Humph! What's wrong with me playing with women? I've been in the entertainment industry for more than 20 years, and I've only played with a dozen women. But that bastard Link has been in the entertainment industry for less than six years, and he's had sex with more than a hundred women, and even made them pregnant. He's so shameless and so obscene. Compared to a sex maniac like him, I'm more innocent than a virgin.
But that bastard forced me to donate money and apologize to those bitches. Bah! In fact, the person who should apologize the most, no, the person who should be arrested and sentenced the most is him, that damn bastard Link. "
Harvey yelled angrily.
Bob scratched his ears with his fingers and sighed, "Harvey, it's already happened. There's no point talking about it now. We might as well learn from this lesson and make good movies in the future to try to make more money."
"I will never let this matter go. Link, that bastard, caused me to lose $4 million. I will always remember this money and will get it back a thousand times in the future."
Harvey shouted with a ferocious look on his face.
Bob was helpless. Harvey had suffered a great loss this time. It would be very difficult to get him to let it go and not pursue the matter anymore. He could only slowly persuade Harvey not to offend Link again.
Ding-a-ling!
The desk phone rang and Bob answered it instead of Harvey. The caller was Michael Ovitz, who was delivering the message on behalf of the Disney board of directors.
In view of the negative impact that Harvey's recent scandal has brought to Miramax Films, for the sake of the company, the board of directors decided to suspend Harvey's work and ask Bob to take over Miramax Films instead of Harvey.
"No! I don't agree!"
Harvey reacted violently, shouting, "This matter has passed and there will be no more reports in the future. Why do you want to suspend my work?"
"Harvey! In addition to the scandal, it is also related to your performance in the past two years. Under your management, Miramax's performance has been getting worse and worse, and the fiscal deficit has been increasing year by year. If this continues, Miramax will go bankrupt sooner or later."
"Michael, it's not just Miramax that has seen its performance deteriorate in recent years. Disney has as well. We all know this is because of the rise of Guess What? Pictures. It was Guess What? Pictures that stole our box office. It's not my fault. You can't put the blame on me."
Harvey retorted.
"Harvey, this is the decision of the board of directors. If you disagree, you can attend the next board meeting. If you can convince the board members to support you, you will have a chance to return to your original position. Before that, you should put aside your work at Miramax and deal with the scandal."
Michael Ovitz said and hung up the phone.
Harvey gritted his teeth and swung the baseball bat to hit the ball hard.
"Harvey, this is my office, please be gentle."
Bob said hesitantly.
"What did you say?!"
Harvey turned around angrily, swung the stick and was about to hit Bob. Bob was so scared that he ran away with his head in his hands.
(End of this chapter)
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