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Woody Allen sues Amazon for $68 million after they axe his film deal

DOS_patos

Unverified Legion of Trill member
It's a rainy day at Amazon Studios.

Woody Allen is suing the streaming service after it shelved his most recently completed film, "A Rainy Day in New York," and canceled his multi-film agreement.

The "Annie Hall" director's high-profile deal was axed last summer, after old sexual assault allegations from his adopted daughter Dylan Farrow hit a renewed crescendo.

Allen's lawsuit, obtained by USA TODAY, was filed in New York Thursday to the tune of $68 million.

“Amazon has tried to excuse its action by referencing a 25-year-old baseless allegation against Mr. Allen, but that allegation was already well-known to Amazon (and the public) before Amazon entered into four separate deals with Mr. Allen – and in any event, it does not provide a basis for Amazon to terminate the contract,” the filing states.

Amazon, the lawsuit snipes, began as an "online bookstore" and used Allen to legitimize its fledgling Hollywood studio. The suit states the streaming service had promised "to finance and distribute (Allen's) future films and to be his 'home' for the rest of his career."

The filing, submitted by Allen and Gravier Productions, states that in June 2018, Amazon backed out of their deals with the director "purporting to terminate them without any legal basis for doing so, while knowing that its actions would cause substantial damage to Mr. Allen, Gravier, investors and the artists and crew involved in making the films."

Representatives for Allen and Amazon did not respond to USA TODAY's request for comment.

The lawsuit additionally states that in terminating Allen's deal, Amazon only vaguely referenced that the director's films "became “impracticable” for the streaming service because of “supervening events, including renewed allegations against Mr. Allen, his own controversial comments, and the increasing refusal of top talent to work with or be associated with him in any way."

Dylan Farrow, Allen's adoptive daughter, in 2014 renewed the claim that Allen molested her in 1992 when she was 7 years old. In December 2017, as the #MeToo movement hit Hollywood, she penned an op-ed, asking why her adoptive father had been "spared."

Dylan's brother, Ronan Farrow, who helped break the Harvey Weinstein sexual-misconduct allegations with his story in the New Yorker in 2017, has also renewed attention to the allegations leveled against his father.

Allen has long denied Dylan's allegations. He was investigated but not charged.

Allen was originally signed to a massive overall deal by former Amazon Studios head Roy Price, who himself resigned in 2017 after being suspended over allegations of sexual harassment.

In 2016, Allen's "Crisis In Six Scenes" limited series debuted on Amazon. The same year, his first Amazon-distributed film, "Cafe Society," opened the 2016 Cannes Film Festival.

Allen and Amazon would go on to ink a new multi-million dollar agreement, which gave way to the Kate Winslet and Justin Timberlake-led "Wonder Wheel," a film that closed the New York Film Festival in October 2017 amid several exposes on Weinstein and the beginning of the #MeToo movement.

At the time, the Daily Beast's Kevin Fallon described the particularly uncomfortable experience watching "Wonder Wheel" in his review, writing that it's "an almost unfathomably awkward time to premiere a new film from Woody Allen, who himself has been subject of sexual abuse allegations, and which is distributed by Amazon Studios, whose programming chief (Price) has just been accused of sexual harassment as well."

"Wonder Wheel" went on to tank at the U.S. box office, pulling in just $1.4 million.

Allen's next Amazon film, "A Rainy Day in New York," which was completed (and the lawsuit states, held back from release) last year, stars Jude Law, Selena Gomez, Elle Fanning, Liev Schreiber, and Timothée Chalamet.

In June 2018 Allen continued to push back against the allegations against him, saying he was a "big advocate" of #MeToo and that he should be the poster face for the movement because he has worked with hundreds of actresses over 50 years, and they've never "suggested any impropriety."

While many actors, including Rebecca Hall, Greta Gerwig, Mira Sorvino and Chalamet, have expressed regret over working with Allen, several longtime collaborators, including Diane Keaton, have defended him.

And last September, Allen’s wife of 2 years and Mia Farrow’s adopted daughter, Soon-Yi Previn, spoke out for the first time.

“What’s happened to Woody is so upsetting, so unjust,” Previn told New York magazine, saying Allen's ex "has taken advantage of the #MeToo movement and paraded Dylan as a victim. And a whole new generation is hearing about it when they shouldn’t.”
 
I think the argument is more that this story is been out in public for quite some time, so why is Amazon reneging on the deal. Not so much about stopping the story from actually coming out...
You're right.

What up twinz
 
Props to Amazon for shelving this pedo mf
I hate that people don’t think for themselves anymore. Even grown people who should know better, sit up and get fairytaled by the media. I mean, some of these people have been around for so long, you can do your own search of their histories, but instead; the white man we say we hate or don’t trust, is the one shaping our minds on how to think and what to think:

https://www.showbiz411.com/2017/12/...ears-in-maryland-prison-for-child-molestation

http://mosesfarrow.blogspot.com/2018/05/a-son-speaks-out-by-moses-farrow.html
 
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Good. Never watched nah one of his movies and I been side eyeing some of my fav actors for working with him.
 
On the one hand I don't want him to win his lawsuit (as much as I hated cancelling Megyn Kelly meant she walked away with $68m - funny how that's the same number Woody is asking for) but there is some legitimacy to his claim, if Amazon reneged on the basis of those pedo allegations from his adopted daughter.

They knew that going into the deal, the same way most actors who work with him know about it too.....so don't play dumb when the climate changes and there's noise e.g. #metoo going on now

Chances are they'll settle all of this out of court...in other words Woody will get a lil bread from them to fuck off
 
THAT's why this whole retro "cancelling" shit is dangerous that MeToo championed: I don't like the fact that pedo shit was all the rave apparently, but at the same time, punishing muhfuckas for questionable shit from 20-30 years when they broke no laws is outlandish.

FUCK-a Woody Allen, for the record.
 
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