Behind the expose

The story of the journalists who unearthed movie mogul Harvey Weinstein’s sex crimes becomes its own big screen drama.

- MICHELE MANELIS

When journalists Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey published their bombshell 2017 New York Times piece exposing movie mogul Harvey Weinstein’s numerous sexual assaults, they couldn’t have foreseen that they had launched a movement. The #MeToo hashtag had been created by activist Tarana Burke long before Weinstein was exposed, but it now exploded as women raced to tag their own stories of sexual harassment, assault and rape on social media.

The pair’s diligent reporting also prompted a radical shiftin gender politics in the entertainment industry, among others. From the moment the article landed, actresses rejoiced that a day of reckoning had finally arrived for rapacious Hollywood oligarchs. Studio executives and bigwigs nervously plumbed their memories as the Weinstein effect took hold, with other players falling one by one.

Now, as Weinstein is on trial on multiple charges in Los Angeles, comes the first inevitable dramatisation of his downfall. The film, She Said, is based on the 2019 book She Said: Breaking the sexual harassment story that helped ignite a movement, that Twohey and Kantor wrote about their Weinstein investigation.

Carey Mulligan and Zoe Kazan star as the two reporters in a real-life journalism drama that is earning favourable comparisons to All the President’s Men and Spotlight.

“I was terrified the whole time, and I still am,” says Mulligan of portraying Twohey. “It’s a daunting prospect to play anyone real, let alone to play a real hero of our society. These women operate at the highest level in what they do, and it was remarkable and fascinating to learn about that.”