The Daily Beast Podcast - How Ken Auletta Helped Ronan Farrow Nail Harvey Weinstein

Episode Date: July 31, 2022

The New Yorker’s Ken Auletta tells Molly Jong-Fast about the conversation he had with Ronan Farrow ahead of his bombshell piece and shares stories about Harvey Weinstein’s enablers that are in his new book, Hollywood Ending: Harvey Weinstein and the Culture of Silence, which paints an even more detailed picture of Weinstein, and the enablers around him. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi, I'm Molly Zhang Fast, no relationship to Kim Jong-un. I'm a left-wing pundant and a writer at the Atlantic Invo. And I'm Andy Levy, former Fox News and CNN-HLN guy and current cable news conscientious objector. And I'm producer Jesse Cannon, and I'm here to make sure things don't go too far off the rails. We're here to have fun, smart, conversations with the wisest and funniest and funniest people in science and media and politics that help make what's happening today clearer. Our world has been turned upside down, and on the new abnormal, we'll talk about the people who got us into this mess and how we'll hopefully get ourselves out of it. Hello, and welcome to another Sunday bonus episode of The New Abnormal, and we thank you so much for being here. Today we have an extra special guest with Ken Ayeletta, who you of course know as a writer for The New Yorker, and he has a new book called Hollywood ending, Harvey Weinstein, in The Culture of Silence. And I'm sure by that title, you can guess what we're going to talk about it, and it's a great interview.

But first, let's have some fun. All right. Are you guys ready to listen to some clips? Clips. Yeah, all right. So our former president, Mr. Trump, as they call him, he's been back in the news a lot lately. We're going to visit some of his very fine remarks that he's made this week because there's just a plethora of great ones he said first before we really get into the fun stuff. So first up, a friend of mine recently said that I was the most persecuted person in the history of our country. me, the most persecuted.

I never thought it that way. I never had time. I was always fighting with these people that were trying to persecute me. I didn't have time to think about being persecuted because I was fighting persecution. When I thought about it, though, I sat back. He's a very smart guy successful.

I thought, sat back. I said, you know, he may very well be right. Certainly there's been no politician or president treated like I've been treated. I mean, yeah, he did a lot of crimes, though. I mean, I don't know. I don't fucking know. I think maybe what his friend said is he's the most prosecuted.

Well deservedly prosecuted. In American history. Yes. That would make sense. Yeah. I don't even know what to say. It kind of perfectly, like to take it out of the realm of joking, it kind of perfectly does sum up the way that all the Trumpers feel. Yeah.

Yeah. Like they constantly think that they are. being persecuted and that everything is a plot against them and everything is a plot against white people and against men and whatever. So it kind of makes sense that their leader feels that way about himself. Yeah. It's one of the legs of Trumpism is that it will always be the victim. Yeah, absolutely. Well, he also has some other very wacky theories. This one's on 9-11. You're so closely associated with the city of New York. You, of all people, understand the passion surrounding 9-11. What do you say to those family members who protested earlier this

week and we'll be doing so again on Friday? Well, nobody's gotten to the bottom of 9-11, unfortunately, and they should have. As to the maniacs that did that horrible thing to our city, to our country, to the world. So nobody's really been there, but I can tell you that there are a lot of really great people that are out here today and we're going to have a lot of fun and we're going to celebrate and money's going to charity. A lot of money's going to charity. And yeah, really the best players in the world, many of the best players in the world, and soon you'll probably have all of them. He's best friends with MBS. Yeah, and we should point out that this is about hosting a golf tournament for this LIV tour, which is bankrolled and run by the Saudis.

And let's also be clear that if three cents of money makes it to a charity from this thing, I will be shocked. I will be absolutely shocked because it doesn't work that way with Trump. But it's just amazing that he is hosting a golf tournament and he takes it, uses it as a way to cast doubt on the fact that, you know, the majority of the hijackers were Saudis. That's just hilarious. I'm going to be honest with you. I think you guys got this all wrong. This is him just going after was Cheney's father personally. That's what I think.

Oh, you might be lucky. Oh, Jesus. That's a joke, audience. That's a joke. Do not say I'm a truther. He's got more to say. As we know, Trump is very, very bad at picking candidates, especially this round in this midterm election. Or very, very good at picking candidates.

You make a solid point here. But so everybody always talks about his audience is just sycophants for him, but sometimes, not so much. And a highly respected man just endorsed by me today, future congressman for the second district, Eli Crane. Thank you, Eli. What? But you like me, right? I mean.

But you like me. Wow. Problem is here that Trump is endorsing Eli Crane, who is running against Ron Watkins, who is like one of the fathers of the father of QAnon. And so you get the people in the audience who are probably booing because they like Ron Watson. And they don't like Trump going against the head of QAnon because they should be, you know, sympathico. So that's what's sort of funny about this is that you've got like two MAGA people running and there are people in the audience who like the other one.

It's not that, you know, you would like to think in a sane world Trump would be booed because he was endorsing the craziest candidate. Yeah. But it's not so much in this case. He somehow managed to not endorse the craziest candidate. Yeah, right. It's an amazing little piece of sorcery there. One might argue apples and ardues of cuckoo, but yes, definitely a more rot d'arge. Mr. Watkins.

No, no. I'm sorry. Ron Watkins, the pig farmer who created QAnonon is probably the crazier. Son of the pig farmer, Molly, geez. Oh, it's the pig farmer's son. Oh, sorry. There's nothing wrong with farming pigs. Listen, I have like 15 pigs in my backyard.

I just, I don't like the way you said that, Molly. You said he's a pig farmer with your coastal neoliberal elitism. Yeah. And the fact of the matter is pig farming is an honorable job. That's right, man. That's why I have all those pigs in my backyard. Okay, I'm going to break this fight up because Mr. Trump has one more thought. You know, as we know, he was the originator of the greatest idea of how to handle immigration

ever the failed wall. Oh, yeah. Oh, no, I'm excited about this one. This is, he's really, he's really going back to the drawing board and cooked up something great here. Yes. Of all of the bad ones and the police know almost immediately who the bad ones are and that we can do and that we can do fast and easy. At the same time, we should implement a bond system and a financial penalty so that anyone who comes to our country on a temporary visa and fails to depart suffers significant financial consequences and we take the money away from the country. We charge the country $25,000 each for each person that comes in illegally. Just a brilliant plan. Why don't you just take their trust funds? I mean, personally,

I'm going to take their 401 case because, by the way, if Mexico's not going to pay for the fucking wall. They're not going to pay you $120,000 a person. All right, in case you're wondering. He still thinks Mexico is going to pay for the wall. I think he thinks that Mexico paid for the wall and the wall is built. I think you're right. I think you're right, actually. I think he actually said that the other day. I think you're probably right about that. I mean, what's amazing about living in a world this stupid. And again, who knew the slide to fascism would look like idiots. But is that, no, he's either. lying or really believes that. And either way, it doesn't matter because his supporters,

you know, we are in this post-truth apocalypse. So, you know, they're all for it. Absolutely. Okay. Well, thankfully, we've gotten through that treasure trove, but there still was people with very bad things to say this week. Podcast least favorite, Glenn Greenwald, was interviewing noted conspiracy theory performance artist, psychopath Alex Jones at his documentary premiere this weekend. He had quite some things to say about Mr. Jones. So, Alex, let me actually begin by asking you a little bit about that in terms of your intentions and the like, because I, when I remember when I watched the film, it was just so striking this early footage of you. And I remember when the internet first discovered some of the early pictures of you from your public access days in Austin, I remember liberals being almost horrified, like with this cognitive dissonance, like we're supposed to look at him as a screaming, spitting monster. And yet these pictures are disturbingly handsome in this like very mainstream normal way.

you obviously from the beginning had a kind of charisma, a natural charisma in front of the camera. That's what people even said from the first time they saw you. And so when you combine these attributes that you had when you were young, I think you clearly, had you been somebody who was willing to affirm rather than question establishment pieties, could have ended up as like a meteorologist on like Good Morning America or like some Anderson Cooper type. Yeah, he's just like Anderson Cooper. Yeah, that's what I think of Alex Jones. I think of just a fat, insane, drunk Anderson Cooper.

That's what I think of. Remember when Anderson Cooper said the water is turning the frogs gay? Remember that? To frame a guy who called and continues to call, Sandy Hook, a false flag, as someone who doesn't go along with establishment pieties? Like, what the fuck? No one has kissed the ass of a Mr. Jones. this much since the counting crows.

And it's disgusting. And honestly, like, Greenwald, I used to like him. Like, I never liked him. I know. A lot of people didn't, and it turned out they were right and I was wrong, which, as happy as I am when you were wrong, Molly, I'm unhappy when I am wrong. But I, on the other hand, am happy when you are. I know you are.

I know. And this just gives more ammunition to you and all my other haters. and it's really annoying, but for Greenwald to sit up there and characterize Alex Jones as someone who goes against establishment pieties as if he's some, again, he's going along with Jones's notion that he is some brave truth teller.

And it's fucking gross. And I don't know, I honestly don't know how Greenwald lives of himself at this point. I really don't because it's so disgusting. Like, I'm really angry about this. Cult of contrarianism is a hell of a drug. I think he's got brain worms. Yeah.

I want to say for the fact, check, I can remember a young Jesse in 2003-ish seeing John Ronson bring Alex Jones to Bohemian Grove, which is his literal origin. And I did not think that that is a handsome newscaster who looks like Anderson Cooper. That's all I'm saying. I said, that guy looks crazy and like he mainlines barbecue all day long. Well, you're going to see the documentary, so you'll let us know. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

God help me. I'm going to see Oppenheimer, which comes out in a year. Yes, yes. So, a closing thought, though, my pillow guy really sums up how he got to his political conclusions with this recent interview he did, and I'd like you guys to react to it. You know, in politics over, you know, the last 10, 20, 30 years, no one, they cared. No one paid attention. no one was looking at what they were doing. I certainly didn't.

I was on crack. Right. That's a good excuse. I can't really use that excuse myself, but, you know. He really was on crack. He was indeed on crack. Crack. Yeah, he was on crack.

Well, at least it didn't do any long-term damage. Really? He's just like that thing of like, why spend all of your fortune when you know you aren't very studied on a subject? Well, speak for yourself, man. I like his documentaries. I have watched those too. Some people say that a mustache

makes you look ridiculous. But it's not just the mustache that makes them look ridiculous. Does having a mustache make it harder to smoke crack? I bet he got the mustache after he post-crack. Yeah, that's a sobriety mustache, if I've ever seen one. Yes, I agree. I agree.

This is the analysis the daily base pays us for. Yeah. Yes, exactly. Ken Ayuleta is a writer for the New Yorker and the author of Hollywood ending Harvey Weinstein and The Culture of Silence. Welcome to the new abnormal, Ken Aletta. Thank you. It's a perfect title, actually. Abnormal. So I want to talk to you about this book. How did you decide to write this Weinstein book? I had profiled Harvey Weinstein in 2002 for the New Yorker.

And I came within inches of nailing him as a sexual predator. but I couldn't get two women whose names I had to speak. And when I confronted Harvey with the claim that he had abused Rowena Chu and Zelda Perkins at the 1998 Venice Film Festival, he denied it, said they were blackmailing him and threatening to tell his wife and destroy the life of his three young daughters. I had no women to claim otherwise. And so the New Yorker editor, David Remnick, made a decision, which I agreed with,

that we didn't have the goods. We went off the National Enquirer, and therefore we couldn't publish rumors. We needed to be able to confirm them. It's such an incredible book because what you do is you granularly. You tell the story, but you also get the women and the allegations and his denials, which are, I mean, were you surprised that he never, that none of us, he never managed to vary his denials?

Niles at all? No, because, you know, when I profiled him in 2002, and the portrait I portrayed, which he hated, by the way, was of a violent bully who often lost his temper and yelled at and sometimes physically assaulted people he disagreed with or to make a point. And he would constantly tell me, you know, I'm reforming, I'm different. I won't do that again. And he's done that throughout his life. He never apologizes. He's like Trump that way. No apologies, no remorse, no contrition. And so I came to expect that. So the thought that Harvey would vary his defense never entered my mind. I mean, for him, these were all consensual affairs. The woman wanted it. They wanted something from him. And he made a trade. He wanted sex from them.

I'm curious to know when the story broke, when the allegations were, when they finally were able to put together all of these allegations. And these allegations really were. I mean, like with Epstein, there were lots of allegations for all of the 90s and much of the 2000s, but the problem was that no one could ever pin them down, right? What happened was in 2002, I was frustrated. I couldn't get the woman to speak. In 2015, which was the first time Harvey was. ever exposed in the press as a potential sexual abuser. And actually the police intervened and took him to the station house when he allegedly had grabbed the breasts of an Italian model. Police wired her for when she encouraged her to meet with him at a hotel. She met with him and he confessed that he had actually done it and she had the audio tape. Yet the prosecution, the prosecution, they decided not to prosecute Harvey, thinking he was too tough a case.

to win. And there were questions about the Italian model. The Italian model at that point decided to sign a non-disclosure agreement, take a million dollars from Harvey and basically amend her statement that Harvey had abused her to claim that now he actually had, which was sad. And I thought I'd report on that, and that fell through. And then in 2017, Ronan Farrow, then with NBC News, called me up and said he was reporting on Harvey Weinstein. Could he look at my reporting papers and tapes from that from 2002? I listened to him carefully. I thought he was a judicious reporter.

I gave him permission. He then came back to me and said, can I come and interview you? I said, well, I'm finishing a book. You'll have to come out to Bridge Hampton. He said, I will. He came out for three or four hours. And at some point I said to him, Roland, so what are you got? And he said, I've got three women on tape claiming that Harvey sexually assaulted them.

I've got five women on tape, but shielded, their name shielded, saying that Harvey assaulted them. And I've got the audio tape with the Italian model where Harvey confessed to grabbing her breast. I said, my God, you've broken the case. I said, what's the next step? He said, I meet with the president of NBC News on August 8th. On August 9th, I called them. I said, so how'd you do, run it? And he said, they killed the story, and I'm the long.

at NBC News. I could take the story elsewhere, but who would want it? And it wasn't a question he was asking. It was a lament. And I said, Rona, give me a number. I'll call you back. I called David Remnick, the editor of the New Yorker, and I said, David, this kid, I just met him once. I think Ronan Farrow's broken the code. He's got the story here. And he seems to me to be a pretty judicious guy. And Remnick said, have him call me on Monday morning. And he did. And the rest of history. Ronald then went off and did his story for the New Yorker. I had nothing to do with that. He did brilliant work all by himself, and he nailed it as the two New York Times reporters. And in October 2017, both of those stories in The New Yorker and the Times appeared.

And Harvey was toast. So amazing. What an incredibly generous thing to do. I mean, obviously. Well, Molly, I don't know why it's generous. I mean, I wasn't competing with them. I was going to look on another subject. And I was just thrilled that Ronan and then the Times people were able to break the story and make women. And I knew how hard it was. Make women comfortable enough to confess that this monster abuse me and not fear. And one of the things they did very successfully and very smartly, they got the women to act in groups. So they weren't alone.

And they were protected. They were coming out of the club. closet with others coming out of the closet with them. Yeah. And it was very powerful. I thought you wrote about it so well, too. It's a very delicate thing to write about, especially as a man or even as a woman. And so I thought that you really were able to write about it in a really sensitive way, too, which I thought. Thank you. I learned a lot. Yeah. So what happened to Harvey after it finally came out? Well, Harvey, he was exposed in early October of 2017. He made a blustery statement about he'll have a comeback, etc. His brother said, Harvey, you need help. You're a sex addict. And he helped get him into a treatment program in Arizona, which Harvey didn't go for treatment.

He went there, but he basically stayed on his cell phone. He basically could not confront what he had done and unable to. One of the questions I asked him, we had an email exchange when he was in prison. And one of the questions I asked, but he didn't answer, Harvey, when you put your head on a pillow at night after raping, let's say, Jessica Mann, who was a major witness against him in the New York trial, how did you explain to yourself what you had just done? He didn't answer that question. But I think he couldn't answer that question because I don't think Harvey has any guilt. If you talk to doctors and specialists, which I did for this book, and you ask them, what's the thing? definition of a sociopath. They say there are three key ingredients to a sociopath. One is narcissism. Harvey clearly was a narcissist. Two is lack of empathy. Clearly, if you watched him in the trial,

as these women spoke powerfully, emotionally, sometimes Harvey would fall asleep. So he lacked empathy. And third, is lack of guilt. Now, you could have all three of those qualities and not be a sociopath. But I think Harvey was a sociopath, and I think that's what the jury found. They found him guilty. This case is complicated, right? Because there's now a California case. Yeah, Harvey has a 23-year sentence in New York, of which he served two years already. But he was transported out to California for a trial that begins this October, where there's 11 indictments, not five, as it were, in New York. On paper, it seems like a strong case. So he faces that. If he's convicted in L.A., he will be.

be sent back to New York to finish his sentence. And then after he finishes his 23-year sentence, if he lives that long, he will then go back to California to serve a sentence. But there's a third complication. There's a possible trial in London. And so what happened is that if the London trial were coming up after the California trial, which it would, Harvey would go from California to London, prison there and then eventually come back to New York to serve the remainder of a sentence in New York prison. But Harvey's in terrible physical shape. And so the thought that he could live through three sentences at seven years old today is pretty outlandish. Can you talk to us about Harvey's physical condition a little bit? He has stenosis. So he's in a wheel. In the trial,

he was, he walked first with a cane and then with a walker. And now he's in a wheelchair in hospital ward at the prison in L.A. as he was at the prison and outside of Buffalo in New York. So he's got synosis. He's got immaculate generation, so he's blind, nearly blind in one eye and threatened to, that happened to the other eye as well. He's got severe diabetes. A guy who's eating chocolate his entire life and ignored the fact that he had severe diabetes. He's got high cholesterol. He's got a stent in his heart, and he takes 20 pills a day. So he's a pretty, bad physical shape. There's this issue of like copability,

especially with someone like Harvey. How culpable is his inner circle and how culpable is his outer circle? One of the reasons I entitled the book, Harvey Ending, but the subtitle is Harvey Weinstein in the culture of silence. And clearly there is a culture of silence that surrounded him.

How could this man have abused more than 100 women that have come forward. So to date, how could he have done that over four decades and no one blew the whistle on? People had to know. And in the book, I show people who did know, and I show people who should have known. I also tell the story to bring it home with what I thought was a vivid anecdote. Hillary Silver is a young woman, who was an agent, came for a job interview at Miramax in the 90s. And she gets on an elevator, and who's on the elevator, but Harvey Weinstein. And he says, hi, why are you here? She says, we'll have an interview with Human Resources. And Harvey says to her,

come and see me when you're done. Very attractive woman, which Harvey took note of immediately. She goes to an interview in Human Resources and the Human Resources Head takes her down to Harvey's office afterwards. And Harvey, without talking to the Human Resources Executive, points to Hillary and says you're hired. So she's now got a job, but she's going to Europe for three to four weeks. And so she goes, makes her travel her trip plan as plan. She comes back and she gets a call that four executives at Miramax would like to take her out for a drink. And she's thinking, isn't this a wonderful place to work? They're welcoming me by taking me out for a drink. And this must be what this place is like. Surprise. She goes to have drinks with

these four executives, someone from human resources, someone who was a long time, a six, of Harvey's, one of four that Harvey had and two other executives. And they say to her, Hillary, don't come to work here. You're an attractive woman. He will assault you, sexually assault you. You don't want to come to work here. And Hillary so did not come to work there because of that warning. Well, if four people knew that, how many other people knew it? What about Bob? Bob Weinstein, who was his business partner and closest friend for many years. And in the end was the person who fired Harvey in the fall of 2017. He had a weighted vote as Harvey did. And if he got a majority of the board on his side, he could fire Harvey. If the two brothers were aligned, you couldn't fire either one of

them. But Bob fired him. Bob, when I confronted him, said, I knew he was a sex addict. I had no idea he was raping women. And Bob hasn't spoken to his brother since early 2018. Do you believe it or no? I don't know how to challenge it. I mean, If a guy says I didn't know, I have no evidence that he did know. I have evidence that he paid for one non-disclosure agreements back in 1998 at the Venice Film Festival. But Bob claimed to me, as Harvey claimed to me, when I confronted Harvey with this, at the time I was doing the Nioca profile, Bob claimed that Harvey said he was having an affair with Rewinich, and Ruinichu said when he tried to break it off. If you break it off, I will go public and I will tell your wife and your three teenage daughters.

And Harvey said to me, if you write that story, it will destroy my marriage and the lives of my three young daughters. I would have happily and eagerly written it if I can get the woman to confirm it at the time, and I couldn't. But Bob said he paid with his own canceled checks a total of almost $500,000 for the two women. But he says he did it because Harvey said he was being blackmail. not because Harvey had raped or attempted to rape or went at you. Are there people who you feel were enablers from Miramax? Oh, many. I named some in the book.

And one of the things in the trial, you would literally see testimony and email evidence from people who work for Harvey who were enabling his behavior with these women. So, yes, I believe many people knew. For instance, at one point, actresses who were sent to Harvey's suite, and came back to their agent and claimed they were abused. The agents did nothing about that. There were people who suspected Harvey was,

and many people who worked for him would say to me, I quote them in the book, you know, Mark Gill, among Amy Israel, among others, saying, I wouldn't let young, attractive woman to work for me, meet alone with Harvey Weinstein. And Zelda Perkins, who was his London assistant, said she had literally a list of 10 things,

don't do when you're with Harvey, don't sit next to him on the couch, wear two pairs of pants because they'll try and take off one pair immediately when you're alone with him. So it was well known that he was an abuser. Is there anything that really surprised you when you were writing this book? Any number of things surprised me. One of the things that surprised me was his mother, learning about Miriam Weinstein and how she constantly, the household was full of her yelling. So much so that young friends of Harvey's, they play poker every weekend at a different home. they would never play at the Weinstein home because Miriam was always yelling, Harvey, stop this.

Harvey, you're too fat. Harvey this. Now, that doesn't explain Harvey's sexual behavior, but it does help explain his yelling all the time in the office. So interesting. Thank you so much, Ken. Really thank you for joining us. My pleasure, Molly. Thank you.

On that note, we'll wrap this episode of the new abnormal from The Daily Beast. In future episodes, we'll be talking to smart folks from the Daily Beast. and beyond from media, culture, politics, and science, will help us understand what's happening to our country and the world. We hope you'll subscribe to us on your favorite podcast app and share the show on social media. Thanks so much for listening and we'll see you again on the next episode. Want more great listens? Check out our comedy podcast, The Last Laugh, and our star-studded the Daily Beast podcast at

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