As a writer and one of the founders of this website that you’re reading, one of the things I absolutely love about my job is sitting down with interesting people on the record to tell their story. I’ve interviewed all sorts of people — A-list Hollywood directors, A-list models, NFL players, former Navy SEALs… fucking Nelly. The access is one of the great joys of working in online publishing for a website with millions of readers.
What’s not awesome, however, is when the communications professionals who handle these celebrities try to flex and censor messaging. This actually happened to KTLA’s veteran entertainment reporter Sam Rubin while Ben Affleck was junketing for his new hitman movie, The Accountant. Such a request mid-interview is pretty damn restrictive on the freedoms of the press. And if you don’t have a press that can speak freely about public figures without being libelous, what’s the point in living in America? You’re basically Stalin-era Russia at that point.
“If you had told me ahead of time you were going to restrict my questions or if you told me ahead of time these interviews were subject to your editing and control even after the interview took place… I would never have gone to your junket. I would never have been involved with promoting a movie that’s trying to censor reporters covering the movie.”
A++ reporting, Sam. The media needs more heroes like you willing to speak truth to B.S. bubbles of power.