Les Moonves may be finished at CBS. Ronan Farrow’s piece in “The New Yorker” is a devastating portrait of sexual misconduct over many decades. Farrow has gotten a very good and smart actress, Illeana Douglass, to describe a long incident in which Moonves made sexual advances on her, then attempted to ruin her career.
Douglas, by the way. is like Hollywood royalty. Her grandfather was legendary actor Melvyn Douglas, her grandmother was Congresswoman Helen Gahagan Douglas. Illeana dated Martin Scorsese for a decade and appeared in many of his films. She’s not making it up.
Farrow’s piece details Moonves’s alleged misbehavior, and it also details hidden stories at “60 Minutes.” This is so crazy– “60 Minutes” is considered the crown jewel of everything in news. Vicki Gordon is someone I’ve known for decades. She is an impeccable person, full of integrity, and a great producer. That she endured a fellow producer throwing furniture at her and mistreating her is pretty awful. I know she’s telling the truth.
Well, it’s another group of people flushed down the toilet. Moonves and Fager will have a lot of trouble hanging on once this is absorbed. Anyway, it’s time for a female exec producer at “60 Minutes.” For years when Don Hewitt was there (who I liked a lot) the real power was a terrific woman named Esther Kartiganer. She got credit for nothing.
