Cathy Schulman: How Male-Dominated Hollywood Contributes To Harassment Culture
March 12, 2018 – ArticleCould a general pattern of sexism in Hollywood be the causal link toward the long-hushed existence of sexual harassment whose exposure has toppled powerful scoundrels and has fueled the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements in Hollywood?
In the third of a series of interviews done with the hope of illuminating the problem and creating ideas for meaningful reform, Oscar-winning Crash producer Cathy Schulman believes there is a direct correlation between a sexist culture in Hollywood and the dozens of cases that have exposed a predilection of powerful men preying on women, and covering it up with bullying tactics, payouts and non-disclosure agreements.
On the legal side, we set up a companion piece to the helpline, a legal relief panel. Bonnie Eskenazi at Greenberg Glusker helped us design it. We were interested in what to do about the person who is looking at a lawsuit. How can they get a proper evaluation of their claims? What I thought was really crucial, having been through a lot of legal things myself, was that it costs money even to take these meetings with litigators to find out what your case is, and to get a couple of opinions. So what Bonnie was able to do is bring together what is now over 25 lawyers, both civil and criminal. They’ve each donated 12 hours of free time to evaluate cases. We will then try to place victims with litigators who will take the cases on a contingency basis. From there, perhaps victims with strong cases can apply for Time’s Up legal support and access those legal relief funds.