Samantha Morton, the Oscar-nominee best known for her roles in “Synecdoche, New York” and “Minority Report,” revealed on this week’s episode of “The Louis Theroux Podcast” that disgraced studio head Harvey Weinstein tried to ruin her career for turning down a role.
Morton had already received critical acclaim for her role in “Under the Skin” (1997) opposite actor Stuart Townsend, when Weinstein, who ran Miramax Films with an iron fist at the time, urged her to star opposite Townsend a second time in “About Adam” (2000).
“I said, ‘I don’t like it. I think the film is really misogynistic, and I don’t want to be part of it,’” Morton told Theroux about declining the part. “The casting director came back with, ‘You don’t say no to Harvey.’ Well it’s not up to him. I just don’t want to do this film.”
Morton added she was even “über polite” and clarified the film was “just not interesting” to her, only for the casting director involved to warn: “You don’t say no to Harvey.” Morton recalled reiterating she wasn’t saying no to Weinstein, but rather to the project.
“I had a phone call saying, ‘You can’t say no,’” said Morton. “The ‘no’ wasn’t being listened to. So they kept coming back with this role, and I was told unequivocally, ‘You’re not going to work again unless you do this role. I’m going to make your life hell.’”
“You will not work again,” the casting director told Morton.
While the film was made without Morton, she was seemingly blackballed from Miramax films to come. Morton told Theroux that Weinstein refused to cast her in “The Brothers Grimm” (2005) opposite Matt Damon and Heath Ledger, and said she was “unfuckable.”
Left: Valery Hache/Getty Images; Right: Etienne Laurent/Associated Press
Morton started questioning why Weinstein “was anti-me,” only for continuous rejections from his studio ― as well as the Weinstein Company, which he founded with his brother Bob in 2005 ― to remind her of turning down “About Adam.”
“I forgot about it because it was years earlier,” Morton said. “And then all these years later, I realized that [when] I get an offer, get a letter from a director, if Miramax or then the Weinstein Company had anything to do with it, it was just awful for me.”
Morton added that Weinstein had “a deep-seated reason” to “try and destroy” her career, but she was insulated by “independent cinema all over the world” and managed to forge ahead in smaller films — as well as Steven Spielberg’s “Minority Report” with Tom Cruise.
Weinstein was convicted in 2020 of a criminal sex act and third-degree rape and sentenced to 23 years. He was convicted in a second trial earlier this year and will essentially spend the rest of his life in prison.
Morton, meanwhile, recently starred in “She Said” (2022) — a critically-acclaimed adaptation of New York Times reporters Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey’s book about the effort to expose Weinstein for his crimes.
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