Newspaper cuts ties with reporter over 'exclusive' Eastwood Q&A

One of Austria's leading newspapers has severed ties with a Hollywood reporter after admitting she had repackaged old comments by Clint Eastwood and presented them as a supposedly exclusive interview.

- Philip Oltermann

In an apparent journalistic coup, the Q&A was published in the Vienna-based daily Kurier last Friday. It was picked up around the world over the weekend, due to the Oscar-winning actor's outspoken criticism of Hollywood's "era of remakes and franchises."

On Monday, however, Eastwood released a statement saying he had never spoken to Kurier's interviewer, the US-based Austrian journalist Elisabeth Sereda, and branding the exchange "entirely phony."

The accusation piled pressure on Kurier to explain how the piece had come to be published. In a statement released yesterday, its editor, Martin Gebhart, rejected the allegation that the quotes had been made up. He said the author of the article had "convincingly explained that she had spoken to Eastwood 18 times at round tables [group interviews commonly held at festivals]."