Russia’s state-run RT broadcaster is willing to publish director Woody Allen’s memoir after the controversial book was dropped by its U.S. publisher, its editor-in-chief has said.
Publisher Hachette canceled publication of the book earlier this month after a protest by Allen’s son, the journalist Ronan Farrow, led to mass staff walkouts at its New York office. Allen has been accused of molesting his adopted daughter, Dylan Farrow, when she was a child, claims that he denies.
“We will publish your book — if you wish — because we believe no one’s life story should be silenced, and that all sides deserve a fair hearing,” RT chief editor Margarita Simonyan wrote on her Facebook page Wednesday.
Oscar-winning filmmaker Allen, 84, had reportedly shopped his memoir “Apropos of Nothing” to multiple publishers before reaching a deal with Hachette. While his work has been revered for decades, his reputation has largely failed to recover in the post-#MeToo era.
Ronan Farrow’s investigative reporting on the sexual assault allegations against Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein, who was sentenced to 23 years in jail Wednesday, helped catalyze the #MeToo movement.
In a statement on Twitter, Farrow pointed out Hachette’s duplicity in planning to publish Allen’s memoir after it had published Farrow’s book on sexual predators among the elite. He also accused Hachette of failing to fact-check Allen’s book by contacting Dylan.
“It’s wildly unprofessional in multiple obvious directions for Hachette to behave this way,” he wrote. “But it also shows a lack of ethics and compassion for victims of sexual abuse, regardless of any personal connection or breach of trust here.”
Simonyan, however, maintained that it should be up to readers to decide who they believe.
“We will publish your book because we do not endorse Twitter mob justice and blacklists,” she wrote. “We will publish your book because you were not found guilty of any crime before the law, but that has counted for nothing.”
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