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Monday Mini: Women, Entertainment and the Law · Stuff Mom Never Told You

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha and welcome to stephone.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: Never told to your production of I Heart Radio. So
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: quick content warning on this one. We are going to
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: be talking about, um, some sexual assaults and sexual abuse.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: We're not gonna go to in depth into anything, but
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: just wanted to put that out there because as as
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: we round out UM, we're gonna catch up on some
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: news stories, some things women have been doing that are
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: making waves. And for this many we're gonna look at
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: a few headlines around women in entertainment and legal battles. Yes,
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: and we're gonna timestamp this one. It is December one,
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: so a lot can change and a lot is still
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: ongoing with the things we're talking about UM, And we
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: wanted to start with an update Britney Spears Free, Brittany Free,
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: Brittney UM. A few minies ago we talked about Britney
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: Spears is conservatorship and how conservatorships in general canon have
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: been used against women in particular, So go back and
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: check out that episode for more details, but really quickly
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: from the BBC quote, a conservatorship is granted by a
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: court for individuals who are unable to make their own decisions,
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: like those with dementia or other mental illnesses. Spears's conservatorship
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: was split into two parts, one for her estate and
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: financial affairs, the other for her as a person. The
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: conservatorship was put into place in two thousand eight, with
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: Spears's father, Jamie Spears, in charge of it. In November
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: of this year, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Brenda
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: Penny ordered that Britney Spears is thirteen year conservatorship with
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: her father as the conservator, and Spears's assets were transferred
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: to her trust without any medical evaluation required. When the
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: ruling was announced, hundreds of Britney Spears supporters waiting out
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: side broke into tears. Sears posted on her Instagram, Good God,
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: I love my fans so much it's crazy. I think
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: I'm going to cry the rest of the day. Best
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: day ever, praised the Lord. Can I get a naim
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: in hashtag free to Brittany. Some of the allegations Fears
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: made about this conservatorship are truly truly disturbing. Um that
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: she was forced to perform when ill, forced to take
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: medication and birth control against her will. Um that her
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: father placed recording devices in her bedroom without her consent.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: Legal experts have said that the people of the Free
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: Brittany movement, along with the recent documentaries and reports around
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: all of this, really helped the ruling play out the
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: way that it did and brought attention to how conservatorships
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: can be used abusively. Um In fact, politicians from both
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: parties have used this whole thing as an argument for reform.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: As discussed, plenty of more folks are trapped in abusive
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: conservativeships like this and don't have the fame or fans
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: to bring attention to their situation. The legal battle isn't
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: over for Spears. In October, her lawyer filed a hundred
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: plus pay age petition to depose her father, Jamie Spears.
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: Just recently in December, she was granted the right to
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: sign and execute documents herself. In the meantime, Spears has
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: now she's engaged and plans to take time to heal. Yes,
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: and I also do love that she is coming after
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: her haters when she's had to be quiet for so long.
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: Pausing up some tea for us to be sipping on
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: and speaking of legal issues. Recently, Eliza Douche you testified
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: in front of the House Judiciary Committee, for the silence
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: of how forced arbitration keeps victims of sexual violence and
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: sexual harassment in the shadows hearing. So I had a
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: long title. Um she was able to speak for the
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: first time about her experience on the show Bowl with
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: Michael Weatherly, which, by the way, I think it's still going.
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: During her time on set, she had been sexually harassed
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: and fired subsequently for trying to confront Whetherly for his behaviors.
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: And she did this just a private one on one
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: with him and the day after she was actually fired.
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: At the time, she didn't know that she has signed
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: as a part of her contract of mandatory arbitration or
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: forced arbitration, which has been something that has been used
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: by many corporations to keep employees from legally holding them
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: responsible or at the very least having arbitration and not
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: being able to repeal anything and get any justice. So
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: it's a whole, whole big thing, um Doeshu has been
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: an activist as someone who not only had their voice
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: taken from her but getting any justice at all when
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: speaking about the case, as she told the committee of
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: her experience quote in seventeen, I was aggressively pursued by
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: CBS to become a co lead in a show called Bowl.
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: I was told that the role would be a six
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: year commitment to play a smart, strong, leading lady, a competent,
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: high powered lawyer meant to counterbalance the existing male lead,
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: and that the role had been written specifically with me
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: in mind, which is not surprising. She's a really fierce person. However,
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: she goes on in my first week on my job,
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: I found myself the brunt of crude, sexualized and loo
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: verbal assaults. I suffered near constant sexual harassment from my
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: co star from Weatherly, and she testified that while on set,
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: quote off script, in front of about one crew members
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: and cast members, he once said that he would take
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: me into his quote rape van and you lub and
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: long phallic things on me, to take me over his
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: knees and spake me like a little girl. Um. And
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: she continued in her testimony that in another incident she recalled,
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: Weatherly shouted out that he and his buddy wanted to
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: have a threesome with me and began mark penis jousting
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: while the camera was still rolling. And then as I
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: walked off to my coffee break between scenes, a random
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: male crew member sidled up to me at the food
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: service table and whispered, I'm with Bull the show, and
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: I want to have a threesome with you too, Eliza.
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: And this is just a couple of the things that
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: she talks about. And yes, she has gotten a lot
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: of these things that happened on film while they were filming.
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: And though she did have an arbitration that allowed for
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: her to get a settlement as a part of the agreement,
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: it included an n d A, a nondisclosure agreement, making
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: her believe she was not allowed to discuss it at all,
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: even when her perpetrator Weatherly was able to make statements
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: gaslighting her in the New York Times literally say I
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: may have gone off script, says similar things, but this
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: is not what I meant said that, And as in fact,
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: she said that when she was able to show the
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: video of what was happening, it was only shown to
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: CBS and the arbitration person. It will never be able
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: to see the light of day, even though she has
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: all this proof um and this tactic has become increasingly
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: more popular, this whole force arbitration or a mandatory arbitration,
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: especially with corporate and big businesses. And industries. So the
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: Washington Post explains, quote mandatory arbitration, which require employees and
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: consumers to mediate dispute with the business instead of a court,
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: has become the norm in corporate America. Most non union
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: US companies require arbitration, leaving sixty million workers without legal recourse.
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: And that's according to a two eighteen report from the
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: Economic Policy Institute, which is a left leaning think tank.
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: So a lot of information is coming out as in fact,
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: they reported that in twenty during the pandemic, companies have
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: closed over fourteen thousand arbitrations, which has gone up seventeen
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: percent every year, so every year increasing, and that at
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: this time most of the workers have gone through it.
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: Only one point six of those employees win anything, and
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: when they do win something, it is such a low
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: amount that it's insulting. So the best foot pill would
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: be good to go to corporate they can't. And unsurprisingly,
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: these mandated arbitrations quote disproportionately affects low wage workers and
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: industries like retail with large numbers of female and black employees.
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: Not too surprising. Um. And by the way, even if
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: you don't work at one of these companies, you may
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: actually have signed one with your cell phone agreement and
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: or cable agreement so that you cannot file a class
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: action suit. I just found that out right. So the
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: House Judiciary committed voted in favor of the Ending Forced
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Harassment Act, and the bill
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: is slated to go onto the House of Representatives to
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: see if it will pass, which we'll have to go
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: through another system. We know this, UM, and we should
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: see a continued conversation about the Forced Arbitration in Justice
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: Repel Act, which is the Fair Act, which has been
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: around for a minute and did pass in twenty nineteen
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: in the House but did not pass in the Senate.
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: But there's still more conversations happening as we see a
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: lot of unfair treatment within corporations and within the industries. Yeah,
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: and I know we've talked about some of this before
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: UM within California, how they're trying to carve out how
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: India can't be used in this manner to silence people
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: because in fact, UM, I think California did do a
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: ban on forced arbitrations. There's two other states who are
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: talking about it too, but it's very rare. Yes, and
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: we were discussing beforehand. We want to come back and
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: look into this more in depth in a later date. Um,
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: we wanted to talk about something else we have discussed
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: in past episodes, which is the lawsuit between Scarlett Johansson
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: and Disney over a payment dispute around Black Widow and
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: the implications for the entertainment world, especially women. So quick
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: update on that. As of September one, Disney and Johnson settled.
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: Johanson said, I am happy to have resolved our differences
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: with Disney. I'm incredibly proud of the work we've done
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: together over the years and have greatly enjoyed my creative
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: relationship with the team. I look forward to continuing our
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: collaboration and years to come. Johansson is slated to work
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: on a few upcoming Disney projects and is rumored to
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: be returning as an executive producer position or something like
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: that to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The lawsuit was not pretty,
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: and it was hard not to think Disney would have
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: made the statements that this company did the spokespeople did
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: if it was a male starring question, basically calling her
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: selfish and implying she was being catalyst during a pandemic
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: to ask for more money after they'd made a big
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: statement about how Black Widow made sixty million dollars on
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: Disney Plus Premier Access money. Johansson wasn't getting the same
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: kind of as she would have for a theatrical release,
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: which was what was intended to happen pre pandemic when
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: contracts were signed and Disney saw a huge stock market
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: boost because of this. Um So, until then, Johansson had
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: been in negotiations uh with Disney and believed Disney would
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: make a deal with her without having to go to court.
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: But then this happened. In the words of the complaint,
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: it quote not only increased the value of Disney Plus,
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: but it also intentionally saved Marvel and thereby itself what
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: Marvel itself referred to as a quote very large box
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: office bonuses that Marvel otherwise would have been obliged to
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: pay Mrs Johansson. Stars like Elizabeth Olson, Jamie Lee Curtis,
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: and and for Lawrence have spoken out in support of Johnson,
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: and many other actresses are considering similar suits. Um Like
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: when we said when we first discussed this, if this
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: is how they're treating her, Johansson, who was one of
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: the biggest stars out there right now. Imagine the deals
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: people without her resources are getting on movie sets, not
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: just actors, but everyone involved. And since it looks like
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: this pandemic is not going away, the entertainment industry is
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: in a huge moment of flux. And this brought attention
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: to an important conversation that we need to have and
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: that it's ongoing. I know, I told you, Samantha, but
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: it really burned me up after this. How every other
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: Marvel movie they're like in theaters. I mean definitely, and
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: they've been making big money, but they also admit that, yeah,
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: Black Mooddo was a big movie. They just want some
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: people's choice awards, like come on, yeah, yeah, it was
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: every time I saw it him like, good for you,
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: Marvel movie, but the respect because it was so highly
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: into scipated like both hung Chi. I love that movie
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: and the Attempts are really great movies, but I didn't
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: know anything about them. I knew Black Widow was coming,
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: that has been like on its way for so long,
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: and they really had to tweet it like that, come
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: on yeah, And it's hard not to like draw parallels
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: between kind of what happened with her character. And then
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: they're just like, yeah, she's the most important character, but
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: no funeral needed or whatever. Ye sorry, yes, well clearly
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: we have thoughts on that, but we shall stop there
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: for now. These are just a handful of things that
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: are going on, So if there's something else you want
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: us to shine a light on, please let us know.
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: Our email is Stuff Media, mom Stuff at iHeart media
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: dot com. You can find us on Twitter at mom
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: Stuff podcast, or Instagram and Stuff I Never Told You.
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: Thanks as always to our superproducer Christina, thank you, and
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: thanks to you for listening Stuff I've Never Told his
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: production of I Heart Radio for More podcast on my
• 12:55
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• 12:57
  Speaker 1: wherever you listen to your favorite shows. The Blue