As you may have heard, Sony was recently subjected to a massive hacking attack. Some 40 GB of personal data and emails were stolen and distributed on the web. The most embarrassing details are leaking out in drips and drabs. Producer Scott Rudin has come in for a particularly harsh thrashing, given that he was caught on email cracking jokes about President Obama liking Kevin Hart films (because they're both black, get it?) and slamming Angelina Jolie for trying to steal David Fincher away from Sony's long-gestating Steve Jobs biopic.
Now, as you may remember, Angelina Jolie is one of my favorite—nay, probably my absolute favorite—person in Hollywood. So, obviously, #TeamAngie.
However, the idea that these emails reveal some sort of crazy sexist underbelly in the culture at large—the theory promulgated by Jessica Valenti over at that home of reasoned discourse, the Guardian—strikes me as dubious. Here's Valenti:
I don’t know Jolie, so I suppose it’s possible she’s an ego monster of epic proportions – and it’s certainly not news that Hollywood power players badmouth each other. But I find it quite irritating – and more than a little telling – that so many of the entertainment industry’s "brats", "prima donnas" and "divas" are of the female persuasion. What? Russell Crowe isn’t a brat?
When male stars act the fool, it’s seen as part of their rakish charm. Get in bar fights, go home with 20 women, scream at co-workers – it’s all good. But a successful, widely-talented and powerful woman who dedicates her time to international humanitarian causes? She’s a "brat". It’s an insult that you’d use to describe an unruly child, not a grown woman. And "spoiled"? Jolie’s success wasn’t handed to her. She created it.
I'm not sure which universe Jessica Valenti lives in, but the idea that male actors are never, or even infrequently, criticized for their crazy ways is simply untrue. Does she really think that no one ever criticizes Russell Crowe for his bad behavior? That no one would slam him for his "irrational, diva-like behaviour"? That no one would criticize him for "still being a diva" on the set of Robin Hood? That no one would suggest "Russell Crowe and Hugh Jackman are fighting like catty tween girls" on the set of Les Mis? Valenti alludes to Christian Bale's on-set meltdown during the filming of Terminator Salvation. Has she forgotten that we spent months discussing the fact that "Christian Bale is a bit of a diva"? That, "Surprise, surprise — Christian Bale is difficult"? I remember the furor being so bad that when I interviewed Michael Caine in 2009, he peremptorily offered a defense of Bale—this despite the fact that we were discussing the utterly Bale-free Is There Anybody There?
Bruce Willis has been denounced in public by his coworkers. The nation practically ground to a halt while we tut-tutted Charlie Sheen during his adolescent, drug-induced meltdown. Don't even get me started on Mel Gibson.
We, as a society, love portraying our celebrities as difficult malcontents making unreasonable demands of everyone around them while also living outrageous lifestyles. This has less to do with their gender than their profession; we, as a culture, project a weird mixture of envy and resentment and lust when we discuss our divas.
I think it's telling, though, that Valenti has decided that this little bit of insider backbiting is telling of a larger trend of terrible no good very bad sexism. When all you have is a hammer, and all that. Then again, she's probably better off writing about this today than following up on her post about believing Jackie, the girl at the center of Rolling Stone's rapidly disintegrating story about rape at UVA. I'm sure her next piece on that scandal will be a real doozy.