Casey Affleck has opened up about the sexual harassment allegations made against him.
Two women sued the actor and director saying that he harassed them on his 2010 film “I’m Still Here.”
Affleck has been quiet about the allegations, but opened up about the MeToo movement on Dax Shepard’s podcast “Armchair Expert”.
“Who would not be supportive of the MeToo movement? That’s an idea that’s even out there?” he stated. “That there are some people saying ‘We do not believe in equality. We think the workplace should be a dangerous place for certain people and not for others’. That’s preposterous.”
“But it is very, very hard to talk about, and it scares me,” he added. “Mostly because the values of the MeToo movement are values that are at the heart of my being; just the way I was raised, they are baked into my own value system having been raised by a mother who didn’t let us watch ‘Dukes Of Hazard’ when we were like eight years old because it was sexist.”
He continued, “The way I’m thought of, sometimes, by certain people recently has just been so antithetical to who I really am, that it’s just been frustrating. And not being able to talk about it has been hard because I really wanted to support all but I felt like the best thing to do was to just be quiet, so that I didn’t seem to be in opposition to something that I really wanted to champion.”
Both Amanda White and Magdalena Gorka sued Affleck for “sexual harassment” and “intentional infliction of emotional distress” respectively. The ladies settled out of court for an undisclosed amount.,
Affleck noted that he was faced with three options when the allegations surfaced.
“It’s a tough spot to be in,” Affleck said. “Especially if you really do appreciate and want to be a support of the side that seems angriest, and the anger is being directed at you.”
“I sort of decided ‘well I’ll just stay quiet’,” he continued. “Mostly I’ve talked about it a little bit to honour, that like ‘okay this is someone else’s experience of this and it is not my experience, but I… you have to respect that someone else has an experience and take that to heart and allow for it to be as possible as your memory of that experience, you know?”
Two other women who worked on set did come forward and say that they never witnessed any of the allegations but Affleck said it was still his responsibility as the “boss”.
“There was a ton of partying because that was the content of this at-times-documentary, at-times-mockumentary, so we’re recording everything. It was confusing for everybody, and it was deliberately, and that’s my responsibility,” he admitted. “The intention was to have the crew as part of the movie. I don’t know how much they knew they were part of the movie.”
After talking about “sweeping judgement” and how to make the distinction “between the worst cases and sort of what is perceived as the tamest examples of it”, co-host Monica Padman said that women being capable of lying is never factored in.
“I wouldn’t say that it’s helpful to say that ‘well women lie’. Or to approach the argument from the point of who is lying. It actually doesn’t help,” Affleck responded. “What really matters is you resolve this in a way without hitting each other and calling each other liars. It’s not really the most important part of it.”
He added, “Are women paid 70c on the dollar? Are women constantly given a mountain of shit at work? Are men believed over women, and promoted over women? Are screenplays written with male leads, on and on and on? Yes, 100 per cent. That’s really what is important and has to change, and I think is changing. Regardless of — and definitely regardless of how much I sit here and talk about it — all the talk and chatter, that shift is happening.”
He believes that the next generation will be the ones to change things for good.
“Like the NRA; it’s been impossible for my generation to dismantle, but the next generation is going to be like: ‘You’re gone.’ And the idea of having a gay president, it’s like not even going to be a topic. Or having a female president might very well happen right now.”
