Louis C.K. Is Done: A New York Times investigation published today put names and specifics to unsourced stories that had been circulating for years, alleging that the filmmaker-performer pressured five female colleagues to watch or listen to him masturbate. A one-line summary on the Times story strikes at the heart of the charges: “As the powerful comedian found success by talking about his hang-ups, he was also asking female comics and co-workers to watch him masturbate.”
The Times investigation by Melena Ryzik, Cara Buckley, and Jodi Kantor arrived mere hours after the announcement that C.K.’s movie distributor had canceled the premiere of his new film, I Love You, Daddy, a controversy-stoking two-fer in which C.K. plays a C.K.-like television producer who has a sexual relationship with an actress who’s about to star in his new TV show, while his teenage daughter (Chlo� Grace Moretz), a legal minor, is having a fling with a much older, Woody Allen–like film director (John Malkovich). The black-and-white photography and orchestral score are both modeled on Allen’s Manhattan, likewise an uneasy comedy about an older man’s relationship with a teenager. The movie includes a long bit in which the C.K. character’s assistant (Charlie Day) loudly mimes masturbating on an office couch with other people present — including a female producer played by Edie Falco, who looks disturbed but still carries on a conversation with C.K.’s character as if this sort of thing happens all the time. The film’s very release now seems to be in jeopardy, and by the time you read this, it may have been shelved or simply written off as a loss.
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C.K. is only the latest Hollywood power player who seems finished. The allegations of sexual harassment, indecent exposure, exploitation, pederasty, rape, and other offenses have opened up a vortex of shame and punishment that’s vacuuming up the industry like the black hole that opened up at the end of Poltergeist. Whole bodies of work now have asterisks next to them. A couple of hours after the C.K. story broke, former Mad Men writer Kater Gordon accused series creator Matthew Weiner of telling her at the office one night that she owed it to him “to see her naked.” (A spokesperson for Mr. Weiner said that he “does not remember saying this comment nor does it reflect a comment he would say to any colleague.”) Gordon, who was Weiner’s assistant before joining the writing staff, won an Emmy with Weiner for co-writing one of the show’s best episodes, the season-two finale “Meditations in an Emergency.” Gordon told at least one friend about Weiner’s remark, but never formally complained for fear of losing her job. She said the comment shook her, and within a season, she was gone, and never worked in TV again.
The Times investigation by Melena Ryzik, Cara Buckley, and Jodi Kantor arrived mere hours after the announcement that C.K.’s movie distributor had canceled the premiere of his new film, I Love You, Daddy, a controversy-stoking two-fer in which C.K. plays a C.K.-like television producer who has a sexual relationship with an actress who’s about to star in his new TV show, while his teenage daughter (Chlo� Grace Moretz), a legal minor, is having a fling with a much older, Woody Allen–like film director (John Malkovich). The black-and-white photography and orchestral score are both modeled on Allen’s Manhattan, likewise an uneasy comedy about an older man’s relationship with a teenager. The movie includes a long bit in which the C.K. character’s assistant (Charlie Day) loudly mimes masturbating on an office couch with other people present — including a female producer played by Edie Falco, who looks disturbed but still carries on a conversation with C.K.’s character as if this sort of thing happens all the time. The film’s very release now seems to be in jeopardy, and by the time you read this, it may have been shelved or simply written off as a loss.
Related Stories
Louis C.K. Influenced a Generation of Comedians. What Happens Now?
A Timeline of the Louis C.K. Masturbation Allegations
The Controversial Episode of Louie That Now Plays Like a Confessional
C.K. is only the latest Hollywood power player who seems finished. The allegations of sexual harassment, indecent exposure, exploitation, pederasty, rape, and other offenses have opened up a vortex of shame and punishment that’s vacuuming up the industry like the black hole that opened up at the end of Poltergeist. Whole bodies of work now have asterisks next to them. A couple of hours after the C.K. story broke, former Mad Men writer Kater Gordon accused series creator Matthew Weiner of telling her at the office one night that she owed it to him “to see her naked.” (A spokesperson for Mr. Weiner said that he “does not remember saying this comment nor does it reflect a comment he would say to any colleague.”) Gordon, who was Weiner’s assistant before joining the writing staff, won an Emmy with Weiner for co-writing one of the show’s best episodes, the season-two finale “Meditations in an Emergency.” Gordon told at least one friend about Weiner’s remark, but never formally complained for fear of losing her job. She said the comment shook her, and within a season, she was gone, and never worked in TV again.