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Robert De Niro accuses Apple of censoring awards speech
(www.theverge.com)
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this post was submitted on 29 Nov 2023
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I can't rule out a dumb employee trying to make a unilateral change to a speech almost nobody would have known about otherwise, but a miscommunication over multiple drafts certainly strikes me as highly plausible, and I can also understand why the filmmakers would have been encouraging a draft that was more focused on the film than tangential contemporary political issues.
I wouldn't say that contemporary political issues are tangential to the movie. The same thinking and greed behind those murders still drives American capitalism.
I can see Apple and the filmmakers wanting people to not draw comparisons.
I think there's a time and place. Trump is a criminal who should be in prison, but his casual racism against Native Americans is still quite tangential to the Osage murders. I think most filmmakers who made a movie about bad things in the past do indeed want to draw contemporary comparisons (because we should try to avoid repeating past mistakes), but that doesn't mean every comparison is appropriate in every circumstance. Nobody wants rambling acceptance speeches, perhaps even more so at obscure awards shows where there isn't even a large audience who might need to hear the message. The speech as given just wasn't very good. It veers progressively off-topic.
If they didn’t want to hear what HE had to say then why give him an award and a mic?
It is very common for actors to use their speeches as a chance to speak about issues important to them. From Joaquin Phoenix all the way back to Marlon Brando.
This is an obvious attempt from Apple to censor a speech they asked for.
To hear him talk about the film?
Indeed it is, and the result is lots of eye-rolling and complaints. De Niro has many opportunities to express himself on a variety of issues. That doesn't mean every sentence he could possibly say really belongs there whenever he's given a microphone.
If Apple wanted him to only talk about certain things during his speech they could’ve communicated that before he accepted their request for him to give a speech.
He probably would’ve turned down the request.
You acknowledge that it is common for actors to do what he did so it is safe to say Apple knew also.
So Apple takes the “it’s easier to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission” approach and plays dumb.
Apple never asked him to give a speech. This is an acceptance speech for an obscure, untelevised awards show. The winners are invited to speak when accepting it. De Niro worked with the producers/Apple on his acceptance speech. For some reason, the draft loaded on the teleprompter wasn't the version he planned on. There are many different reasons this could be.
If you're going to attribute an action to a company as a whole, then it at least needs to be a decision made by a high-level employee and not some peon. The idea that Apple decided to just unilaterally delete portions of his speech at the last minute, without his consent, is among the least plausible scenarios. Anybody with any actual authority at the company is smart enough to know how stupid that would be. The most likely scenario is pure mistake with multiple drafts in play; the next most likely is a nobody who grossly overstepped their bounds, made their bosses look bad, and has probably already been fired.
“If you're going to attribute an action to a company as a whole, then it at least needs to be a decision made by a high-level employee and not some peon.”
I’ve had many experiences with companies that fire “peons” for bad PR or misrepresenting the views of the company or however HR wants to word it to avoid legal problems.
It is very easy for CEOs or upper management or middle management to pass down orders that are worded in a way that imply what they want workers to do without saying it in a legally binding way.
“The idea that Apple decided to just unilaterally delete portions of his speech at the last minute, without his consent, is among the least plausible scenarios.”
Then why is it the first conclusion that De Niro and many others came to?
“Anybody with any actual authority at the company is smart enough to know how stupid that would be.”
Because it looks like they are censoring his speech.
Seriously, just think through this. Be super conspiratorial if you want to. There's no upside for Apple as a company. There's no reason anybody in power would even be involved in the speech in the first place. It's a minor awards ceremony that effectively nobody watches. If it were a conscious decision, it would obvious piss off De Niro, which seems like an extra stupid idea.
What's more likely? A: Intentionally anger a big-name actor by trying to force him to change a speech that nobody was going to hear, or B: Someone accidentally sent the wrong final draft.
He said it before he had any time to reflect on it or carefully choose his words to parse out the nuance we're discussing now.
It’s not some crazy conspiracy to say this doesn’t look like an accident
deleted
Nobody ever said he was lying. He made a statement, live, based on his current understanding of the situation. Later, someone else offered a perfectly plausible explanation.
it's too much of a coincidence that the removed parts were the most controversial ones. that's a pretty weird change for allegedly an "older draft version".
additionally, it's not the first time Apple has removed controversial topics in a short period of time. I might not agree with DeNiro at all, but I'm convinced that those parts of the script were removed purposefully by Apple.
What's plausible or reasonable about independently editing someone else's speech and not even bothering to make sure they knew about it?
It’s not perfectly plausible when it happened earlier lmao keep shilling
The person you were replying to also didn't say he was lying?
I'm aware, but at the moment on stage, it wasn't possible for him to know the truth in the first place so it's not about whether we think De Niro was "telling the truth." He was speculating.
He made a guess based on the evidence he had. It may or may not be "true" or factual. Either way, he wasn't lying, and the person you responded to didn't say anything about him lying.
You know, when I wrote it I actually questioned whether I should use the word "lying," or if doing so would cause an overly nit-picking response, but I decided to expect the best in people. Surely they'd see that I was establishing a shared premise that he wasn't lying, which is the usual opposite of "telling the truth," while pointing out that he wasn't necessarily telling the truth. There's a middle ground of ignorance.
But by all means, thank you for interjecting yourself in the conversation to state the obvious.
Regardless of whose idea it was to cut the speech, the fact remains that someone made a censored draft, the organizers received it along with the full speech, and the censored version ended on the prompter without De Niro's consent. Perhaps Apple wasn't responsible, but then who?
Or a former version of his speech didnt have any politics in it because it was a draft, and he passed it to someone for review on what he had already written.
Then that copy somehow got mistaken for a, if not the, final draft.
I do that when writing. I ask for review on what I have written down, even knowing that I have more to add but just dont know how to start putting to words yet.
I don't buy this theory as he should have easily recognized it was an earlier copy of what he wrote rather than stopping and stating that someone edited his words as if he'd never seen the speech in this form.
I don't think we can quite say that. Speeches usually have a time limit. It would be perfectly normal to write more than you can actually say and then start cutting back or rewording parts to make it shorter. That's not "censorship." If you're cutting down an acceptance speech, the more off-topic stuff is naturally going to be looked at critically. I'd expect there to be multiple drafts with different portions cut out so it's not so much as a "full" verses "cut" speech but which version of cuts was the final version.
I don’t buy it. Those decisions always include the actor for obvious reasons.
“Oops! We aCciDeNtLy cut out the part that might cause insurrection supporters to not watch our award show! Aww shucks our mistake increased our ratings.”
It's not a televised. It's an obscure awards show that almost nobody saw.
So.. the kind of situation where Apple would want more viewers.
Apple did not produce or distribute the event. I think they'd be perfectly content with zero viewers. CODA won two Gotham Awards, including Troy Kotsur for best supporting actor. Did Apple talk about it then? No. What about when CODA won big at the Oscars? Apple dedicated two long paragraphs of the press release to talking about the other awards CODA won but the Gotham Awards are so irrelevant that they didn't even get a single throwaway mention.
CODA is irrelevant here.
Apple admitted they made a mistake with the teleprompter.
We can only speculate why it happened.
Considering the context of what was removed I doubt it was a coincidence.
We don't have any statement from Apple. "A source close to the film" said it was a mix-up with different versions of the draft and that Apple didn't know De Niro hadn't signed off on that one as the final version. The source anonymous to us, but not to Variety, and they judged the person credible.
“Apple didn't know De Niro hadn't signed off on that one as the final version”
Then they are at fault for not verifying they are putting the right words on the teleprompter
Yet this kind of encouragement seemed a tiny bit... unwelcome maybe? 🤣
I think he's experienced enough to know that when your movie is out in theaters right now, the studio always wants you to use every possible opportunity to talk up the film, and would prefer you not go off on tangents. If nothing else, that's a reasonable request.
Yes, lets not talk about modern racial issues and instead focus on this for-profit film we based off of classic racial issues. We want revenue not awareness!