Entertainment

These are the women expected to testify against Harvey Weinstein at his second sexual assault trial | CNN

Published

2 years ago

October 27, 2022

These are the women expected to testify against Harvey Weinstein at his second sexual assault trial | CNN

CNN
—

Reporting 5 years in the past on Harvey Weinstein’s alleged sexual abuse spurred girls to talk publicly about their very own experiences with sexual violence in what turned generally known as the #MeToo motion.

Now, in a Los Angeles courtroom, eight girls are set to testify in a trial altogether much like the one which led to Weinstein’s landmark conviction two years in the past.

Weinstein, the 70-year-old film producer, has pleaded not responsible to 11 prices primarily based on allegations of sexual assault at Los Angeles resorts between 2004 to 2013.

Opening statements within the trial started Monday and one girl has already testified about her alleged assault. Three extra girls are anticipated to testify on to the costs, and 4 different girls are anticipated to testify as “prior unhealthy acts” witnesses, that means their testimony isn’t instantly related to a cost however might be thought of as prosecutors attempt to present Weinstein had a sample in his conduct.

He was discovered responsible in New York in 2020 of first-degree prison sexual act and third-degree rape and was sentenced to 23 years in jail. He has appealed.

Right here’s what we all know concerning the girls set to testify within the California case and the costs related to their allegations primarily based on feedback from the prosecution, the protection and their testimony.

Weinstein is charged with forcible oral copulation and forcible rape of Jane Doe 4 between September 1, 2004, and September 30, 2005.

Jane Doe 4 has been recognized as Jennifer Siebel Newsom, a filmmaker and the spouse of California Gov. Gavin Newsom. In an announcement, her attorneys confirmed she could be testifying towards Weinstein in courtroom.

“Like many different girls, my consumer was sexually assaulted by Harvey Weinstein at a purported enterprise assembly that turned out to be a lure,” stated Beth Fegan, certainly one of Siebel Newsom’s attorneys. “She intends to testify at his trial to hunt some measure of justice for survivors and as a part of her life’s work to enhance the lives of girls.”

Siebel Newsom is a Stanford College graduate who has written, directed and produced a number of documentaries, together with “Miss Illustration,” “The Masks You Stay In” and “The Nice American Lie.” Throughout her time as California’s first accomplice, Siebel Newsom has advocated for working moms and launched initiatives centered on closing the gender pay hole, amongst different efforts.

In opening statements, prosecutor Paul Thompson stated the assault occurred when Siebel Newsom was a “powerless actor making an attempt to make her manner in Hollywood.” Weinstein invited her to “focus on her profession” on the Peninsula Lodge, and in a lodge room, he assaulted and raped her, the prosecutor stated.

Protection legal professional Mark Werksman countered that Siebel Newsom had consensual intercourse with Weinstein as a result of she needed his assist getting roles and producing movies.

Werksman additionally stated Weinstein donated to 2 of Gov. Newsom’s political races and that Siebel Newsom took her husband to a Weinstein occasion. “She introduced her husband to satisfy and occasion with the person who raped her. Who does that?” he requested.

Siebel Newsom has written concerning the incident with Weinstein in obscure phrases. In October 2017, only a day after The New York Instances printed its bombshell report on Weinstein, she wrote an opinion editorial for the Huffington Submit saying she believed the report as a result of she had an analogous expertise with Weinstein.

“I used to be naive, new to the business, and didn’t know learn how to cope with his aggressive advances ― work invites with a good friend late-night at The Toronto Movie Competition, and later an invite to satisfy with him a couple of position in The Peninsula Lodge, the place workers have been current after which impulsively disappeared like clockwork, leaving me alone with this extraordinarily highly effective and intimidating Hollywood legend,” she wrote.

Weinstein is charged with forcible oral copulation, sexual penetration by overseas object and forcible rape of Jane Doe 1 on or about February 18, 2013, in Los Angeles County, based on the indictment.

Jane Doe 1 was a mannequin and actress who was married, had three kids and was residing in Italy in 2013. She speaks Russian, Italian and English, however her English was not superb on the time, she stated.

She was the primary witness to testify within the trial and stated she was staying in a lodge for the Los Angeles Italia Movie Competition when she obtained a name that Weinstein needed to see her. She testified she had met him beforehand in Rome.

He got here to her lodge room and tried to rape her, she testified.

“I needed to die. It was disgusting. It was humiliating, depressing. I didn’t battle,” she testified in courtroom. “I keep in mind how he was trying within the mirror and he was telling me to have a look at him. I want this by no means occurred to me.”

Years later, she informed her daughter concerning the assault in an try to attach along with her a couple of comparable concern, she testified. Jane Doe 1 then went to the police in October 2017 as a result of she promised her daughter she would, she testified.

Within the protection’s opening statements, Werksman stated she had fabricated the story and argued there was no proof he went to her lodge room. Beneath cross-examination, she acknowledged she had no proof to point out the jury that will show she was with Weinstein that night time and stated she couldn’t keep in mind all the pieces concerning the incident.

“I keep in mind rather a lot however I forgot rather a lot additionally,” she stated.

Weinstein is charged with sexual battery by restraint of Jane Doe 2 on or about February 19, 2013, in Los Angeles County.

Jane Doe 2 was a 23-year-old mannequin and aspiring screenwriter who had been modeling since she was 12, Thompson stated in opening statements.

She alleges she was assaulted in the course of the Los Angeles Italia Movie Competition, based on Thompson. She met with Weinstein at a restaurant on the Montage lodge and informed him she needed to be a screenwriter, the prosecutor stated. The assembly then moved to an area upstairs, and when Weinstein led her into a rest room, one other girl shut the door behind Jane Doe 2, the prosecutor stated.

Whereas she was trapped inside with Weinstein, he allegedly undid her gown, groped her and masturbated, the prosecutor stated.

The following day, she went to a pre-scheduled assembly with a Weinstein Firm worker and was suggested to go on “Venture Runway,” a Weinstein-produced actuality TV present.

Werksman, the protection legal professional, stated in opening statements that Jane Doe 2 fabricated her story and famous that she met with the Weinstein Firm worker the subsequent day.

Weinstein is charged with sexual battery by restraint of Jane Doe 3 on or about Might 11, 2010.

Jane Doe 3 was a licensed therapeutic massage therapist who usually labored with celebrities and athletes, Thompson stated.

In 2010, she massaged Weinstein after which went to the restroom to clean her arms, and he adopted her into the lavatory, backed her right into a nook, groped her and masturbated, Thompson stated.

Weinstein had recommended Jane Doe 3 might write a e book about her therapeutic massage work, Thompson stated, and afterward an aide to Weinstein paid her $200 for the therapeutic massage and put her in contact with Miramax’s e book division a couple of potential e book deal.

In distinction, Werksman argued that their sexual interplay was consensual and a part of an association. He stated that Jane Doe 3 gave him 4 extra massages after the alleged assault.

“She made a deal. Intercourse in trade for one thing of worth. Jane Doe 3 and Mr. Weinstein have been associates with advantages,” Werksman argued.

Weinstein is charged with 4 counts associated to Jane Doe 5: forcible oral copulation and forcible rape between November 3 and November 9, 2009, and forcible oral copulation and forcible rape on or about November 5, 2010, based on the indictment.

Nevertheless, prosecutors didn’t point out her or her accusations in opening statements of the trial, and neither did the protection. The present standing of those prices will not be clear.

“Whereas we’ve no remark right now, our workplace is tirelessly making certain all the victims on this case obtain justice,” the district legal professional’s workplace stated.

Like in his New York trial, Weinstein’s LA trial will function testimony from a number of “prior unhealthy acts” witnesses.

There are 4 of those witnesses on this case, recognized by their first title and preliminary. Every of those girls alleged they have been assaulted by Weinstein outdoors of LA jurisdiction.

In all, the protection argued these witnesses have been getting used solely to “confuse and overwhelm” the jury. Werksman defended Weinstein’s actions as a part of the “casting sofa” tradition on the time.

The prosecution stated the testimony from these girls will show Weinstein’s guilt on the costs.

“Every of those girls got here ahead unbiased of one another, and none of them knew each other,” Thompson informed the jury.

Ambra B. went to Weinstein’s workplace for a gathering in Manhattan in 2015 and he grabbed her breast and put his hand up her skirt, prosecutors stated. She reported the incident to the NYPD, which then directed her to talk with him on the telephone and at a lodge restaurant and secretly report their conversations, based on Thompson. No prices have been filed towards Weinstein.

Werksman argued nothing on the recording was tantamount to a confession and dismissed her as somebody taking part in a “junior G-man” in an undercover sting concentrating on Weinstein.

Ashley M., a dancer within the film “Soiled Dancing: Havana Nights,” was alone in a lodge room with Weinstein in 2003 and stated he groped her and masturbated on her, based on Thompson.

Werksman argued she didn’t resist or refuse the interplay on the time.

Natassia M. met Weinstein and briefly interacted with him at an business occasion for the 2008 British Academy of Movie and Tv Arts Awards and alleges he raped her at her lodge, based on Thompson.

Werksman stated there was no proof of rape and notes they maintained contact for years afterward.

Kelly S. was an actor in 1991 when, in a lodge room for the Toronto Worldwide Movie Competition, Weinstein raped her, Thompson stated. In 2008, on the identical pageant, she went to his lodge room with the intention of confronting him, and when he allegedly began groping her and masturbating, she left the room, the prosecutor stated.

Werksman attacked the concept that she didn’t confront him instantly upon seeing him once more in 2008 and stated she didn’t report the incident to police till 2018.

Correction: An earlier model of this story incorrectly reported Harvey Weinstein was arrested within the alleged incident involving Ambra B.

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Movie Reviews

Baffling and Beautiful, Misericordia Is the Strangest of French Thrillers

Published

7 hours ago

March 22, 2025

Press Room

Baffling and Beautiful, Misericordia Is the Strangest of French Thrillers

Misericordia.
Photo: Janus Films

Alain Guiraudie’s Misericordia is an existential drama masquerading as a comedy masquerading as a thriller. The French director, whose best-known film Stateside remains 2014’s sunny, rambling queer mystery Stranger by the Lake, specializes in these kinds of slippery genre hybrids, movies that start off as one thing and eventually become other things, all without ever betraying their essence. Misericordia was a major critical hit in France, where it was nominated for mountains of awards and was named the best film of the year by Cahiers du Cinéma. The director’s shape-shifting narratives, forever flirting with the metaphysical, are obviously a known quantity there. It’ll be interesting to see how Misericordia plays in the U.S., where viewers don’t always enjoy having their expectations confounded.

The film begins in a somber and ominous register, as Jérémie Pastor (Félix Kysyl) returns to the small village of St. Martial where he spent his youth to attend the funeral of the baker for whom he worked and with whose family he lived. Immediately, there is tension with the baker’s son, Vincent (Jean-Baptiste Durand). He and Jérémie were once the best of friends, and perhaps even more than that; now their lives have gone in different directions, and a corrosive, inexpressible conflict seems to be brewing between them. Jérémie also grows close with Martine (Catherine Frot), Vincent’s mom, as they bond over their shared memories of the baker. We sense, again, that perhaps there was more to Jérémie’s relationship with his former boss as well. As if that weren’t enough, Jérémie seems to be quite taken with Walter (David Ayala), a portly, reclusive sad sack of a man living on the outskirts of town.

A Sirkian network of desires lurks just under the surface of the drama: Everybody seems to want somebody else. And all that sublimated desire propels the picture’s thrillerlike elements: Jérémie’s conflict with Vincent gets more dangerous, while his fascination with Walter grows. As a pure narrative, this would be mostly ridiculous, but that’s where Guiraudie’s skill as a filmmaker comes in. He and cinematographer Claire Mathon (Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Spencer) give this landscape, with its rough roads and forest canopies and dramatic cliffs, both lyrical beauty and eerie portent: Immersed in nature and removed from society, everybody’s been reduced to their base desires. As a protagonist, Jérémie also bears some similarities to Terence Stamp’s mysterious ambisexual stranger in Pier Paolo Pasolini’s classico-capitalist allegory Teorema (1968) — and just as Pasolini did, Guiraudie grasps that the more ornamentation you strip away from a tale, the purer its perversity becomes. Reason, it turns out, is the greatest luxury.

Misericordia has elements of rural noir, but it gathers both absurdity and lethality as it progresses. Guiraudie isn’t much for emotion in his actors: An unreadable person, after all, is also an unpredictable person. We start off viewing Jérémie as a victim of others’ assumptions and needs, but as he overstays his welcome in this place, his weird, stony persistence allows us to see how this man could drive everyone around him crazy. And yet, the movie doesn’t provide easy answers to any questions of motivation or morality or justice. Maybe because Guiraudie has other things on his mind. As our protagonist’s increasing desperation reaches comic proportions, we begin to realize that all along we’ve been watching a film about how to continue living in a world where our actions constantly cause misery, uncertainty, and pain.

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Entertainment

Ticket platform StubHub files for IPO

Published

9 hours ago

March 21, 2025

Press Room

Ticket selling platform StubHub Holdings Inc. filed for an initial public offering disclosing revenue growth and a small annual loss for 2024.

StubHub had a loss of $2.8 million on revenue of $1.77 billion last year, compared with net income of $405 million on revenue of $1.37 billion in 2023, according to its filing Friday with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company’s adjusted 2024 earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization of $299 million, though down from the previous year, contrasted with a $57-million loss in 2022.

The New York-based company won’t disclose the proposed size or price range for the share sale until a future filing when it’s ready to begin marketing the offering to investors.

StubHub had prepared for an IPO last year after sales boomed from Taylor Swift‘s The Eras Tour, only to postpone those plans citing unfavorable market conditions, Bloomberg News reported in July.

Chief Executive Eric Baker, one of StubHub’s co-founders, left before the business was sold in 2007 to eBay Inc. for $310 million. Baker later founded Viagogo in Europe. In 2019, Viagogo agreed to acquire StubHub for $4.05 billion. The deal was completed the following year, with the combined company continuing to do business under both names.

Baker holds 5.2% of the Class A shares and, with his Class B shares that carry 100 votes each, has more than 90% of the voting power in the company before the offering, the filing shows.

Madrone Partners LP has a 27% stake in the business and 2.8% of the voting power, while WestCap Management owns an 11% stake and Bessemer Venture Partners holds 9.6%. Madrone and Bessemer have board seats at the company.

Across its ticketing platforms, StubHub and Viagogo, the ticket reselling operations span more than 200 countries, according to StubHub’s website.

The offering is being led by JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc. along with more than 10 other banks. The company plans for its shares to trade on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol STUB.

Lipschultz and Roof write for Bloomberg, with assistance from Gillian Tan.

Movie Reviews

Secret Mall Apartment movie review (2025) | Roger Ebert

Published

19 hours ago

March 21, 2025

Press Room

Secret Mall Apartment movie review (2025) | Roger Ebert

“Secret Mall Apartment” is a Search Engine Optimization-friendly title for a documentary that’s about a lot of things that cannot be captured in three words. Directed by Jeremy Workman, it tells the story of a group of friends from a rundown, artist-friendly neighborhood who got pushed out of their homes by gentrification and somehow ended up discovering an unoccupied, seemingly unmapped spot inside of the mall that pushed them out, then began furnishing it as a living space. The process took three years, all told, and during that entire time, they managed to avoid detection by mall security or even other patrons.

Workman has said that as he worked on this film, he “quickly learned that they created the secret apartment to make a statement against gentrification. They had lost their homes as a result of development, and this was their unique personal way to show developers that they weren’t going anywhere.”

However, as the film demonstrates, there were other elements in the mix. One was the thrill of doing a victimless, playful protest crime in plain sight of mall staff and customers who never noticed that the same eight people were hanging out in the mall constantly, rarely buying anything but food court items, and disappearing and reappearing for hours at a time without leaving the complex. The group slowly created a “normal” apartment in a concrete-walled, high-ceilinged, 750-square-foot room accessible only through crawl spaces and a tall set of metal stairs (which must’ve been hell to navigate with the dish cabinet and multiple couches that ended up in the space).

What’s most fascinating of all is that, in a roundabout way, “Secret Mall Apartment” is about artistic expression—and how artists can talk and talk and talk about why they did things, but might never really know the full story because the impulse to create comes from such deep places.

The eight artists were Michael Townsend, the ringleader; his then-girlfriend Adriana Valdez Young, Colin Bliss, James J.A. Mercer, Andrew Oesch, Greta Scheing, Jay Zhengebot, and Emily Ustach. The mall apartment wasn’t just a lark or an invasion by “squatters” (as the local newspaper called them) but an extension of what the eight were already doing in their public-facing careers.

Townsend is mainly a “tape artist” who makes art with easily removable tape meant to be observed and considered and then disappear. He is also a teacher who specializes in instructing people who don’t think of themselves as artists to do art in groups and to encourage people to feel confident in their artistic impulse even if they haven’t had formal training. Under his leadership, the group of eight traveled all over the United States and did what you might call temporary or ephemeral art, often comprised of silhouettes of people, animals, and objects made of paper tape. (You might have heard about the taped silhouettes they did on the sides of New York buildings commemorating the lives of people who died in the 9/11 attacks.)

The various works were playful, clever, gently mysterious exercises. They were meant to remind people of the interconnectedness of human experience and fleeting nature of existence; bring beauty to places that otherwise lacked beauty; stop people in their tracks and make them think about why it’s so revelatory to see art in a place where you wouldn’t normally expect to see art.

Although there are a few re-creations that are clearly identified as such (the filmmakers constructed a replica of the mall apartment and show how it was designed and built in a studio), the movie relies mostly on the incredible amount of low-resolution, early aughts video footage captured by the group. A lot of the footage is process documentation, just showing what was done and how.

But some of it captures tense or raw moments, including arguments about the long-term usefulness of continuing the project and the gap between Michael’s enthusiasm and everyone else’s, and the group’s encounter will mall security while they were truing to smuggle concrete cinder blocks in via the parking garage. (Michael has always had a talent for talking his way out of these kinds of situations, but the movie is wise to admit that this project wouldn’t lasted more than a day if the participants were Black.)

Workman and his co-editor Paul Murphy have an intuitive and very pleasing sense of structure, giving you the information you need at the point in the story where you think, “I wish they’d tell me more about that.” The sense of how to time the appearance of context and explanation in a movie a gift that can’t be taught in schools; you either have it or you don’t. There are times when one might wish they’d dug a little deeper into the personalities and relationships (seven of the eight were publicly unidentified until now). And as complexly as Michael is portrayed, there are connections between his biography and this project that you keep expecting the movie to highlight, yet it never does. (As a child, he moved eight times in his first year of life, which all by itself suggests why a man would build an entire artistic career around things that aren’t permanent.)

But these are nitpicks. This is a delightful, thought-provoking movie that’s about a lot of things at the same time. It’ll make you see the world with fresh eyes, and probably wonder why there isn’t more art in it.