Terry Gilliam's Comments on Weinstein, #MeToo Spark Controversy

For much of his career, Terry Gilliam has been viewed as a beloved underdog. He spent decades getting a distinctive Don Quixote adaptation made; he had the leading man of one of his films die during shooting; he grappled with studio interference surrounding his dystopian masterpiece Brazil. But lately, a series of events entirely of Gilliam’s own making have caused many to lose whatever respect or admiration they may have had for the filmmaker. It’s not career immolation on the level of Morrissey, but it’s not far behind.

First came a December interview with IndieWire in which Gilliam apparently felt compelled to join the “auteurs expressing frustration with the Marvel Cinematic Universe” club. Much of his disdain was reserved for Black Panther, about which he said, “I think the people who made it have never been to Africa.” (Gilliam is incorrect on this.)

Unfortunately, the tone-deaf nature of those comments carried through to an interview that Gilliam did with Alexandra Pollard of the Independent, in which he covered subjects like #MeToo (“#MeToo is a witch hunt”), race (“I’m now referring to myself as a melanin-light male”) and gender (“I’m tired, as a white male, of being blamed for everything that is wrong with the world”).

Pollard’s interview with Gilliam includes her challenging him on several of the points he makes. “It is deeply frustrating to argue with Gilliam,” she writes. “He is both the devil and his advocate.” The dynamic of their conversation is ever-shifting, but it’s one where Gilliam comes off badly throughout — whether or not he’s entirely sincere about everything he says.

Gilliam’s comments about #MeToo are particularly unpleasant in light of comments made by Ellen Barkin, who worked with Gilliam on his 1998 adaptation of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, two years ago. On her Twitter account at the time, Barkin wrote, “My hard won advice: never get into an elevator alone with Terry Gilliam.”

Barkin was responding to comments Gilliam had made about #MeToo at that time. She also added, in another post, “Terry Gilliam, you talk too much.” That’s an opinion that many may share after this weekend.

Subscribe here for our free daily newsletter.