Hollywood liberals eat their own July 21, 2009 at 1:05 pm in Online, People, Television
"Im a blogosphere virgin. I dont read blogs. Blogs feel like theyre a dime a bushel. Theyre endless. Like cockroaches..."
Out, gay-as-a-picnic-basket, proud, loud, blog-challenged and, by all accounts, liberal director Todd Holland inadvertently got sucked on to the Hollywood Liberal Shit List last week. However, the move looks to be temporary in light of his good-natured and at times bitchy response, in addition to being nominated this year for a directing Emmy for 30 Rock, the sitcom starring über-liberals Alec Baldwin and Tina Fey. His placement on the HLSL was further complicated by the fact that he got legally married to his partner last year before Proposition 8 was passed.
How it happened: At a panel discussion about gay Hollywood, Holland answered a question about whether he would advise gay actors in Hollywood to come out. Leave it to some nasty bloggers to take his response and twist or warp his words into anti-gay remarks.
The panel discussion took place at Outfest, the Los Angeles gay film festival held each July at The Directors Guild (a.k.a. Hollywood Liberal World Headquarters.)
So now the LA Times, LA Weekly and those spiteful, overly-sensitive gay blogs manned by (to use Hollands word) cockroaches are tripping over themselves as he trips over himself to clarify and over-explain what he really meant or really meant to say or more likely wishes he hadnt said at all in the first place.
A condensed version of what played out
At an Outfest panel on July 12th, Holland was asked what he says to young, gay actors who seek his advice on whether to come out. I say, stay in the closet.
The LA Weekly posted it on their Queer Town blog.
Shit hits fan as Holland says his words were shoved back into my mouth over and over
and There are only a few things I allow to be shoved in my mouth my mangled words are not one of them.
He clarified today in an exclusive to an LA Times blog: If youre a guy, no one cares
unless youre in that fractional .002 percent of the young male actor population, and you really have the goods to become a true leading man.
In addition to likening bloggers to insects he said studios were like Chihuahuas, and agents and managers do not push rocks up hill theyll push level (but prefer downhill).
But its those awful, mean bloggers who get most of his ire:
60 Minutes journalist Morley Safer said in 2009, I would trust citizen journalism as much as I would trust citizen surgery. I now know what he means. And I feel an obligation to citizen journalists everywhere to muddy the record with a few facts.
But somehow, I sense a newfound respect for us insects.