Hollywood has a dark history of targeting and destroying the reputations of talented women. From Britney Spears to Marilyn Monroe, these actresses faced brutal media scrutiny, sexual exploitation, and systematic attempts to silence and discredit them in the entertainment industry.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00It was very hurtful.
00:02Welcome to Ms. Mojo, and today we're looking at the most heartbreaking
00:06instances of Tinseltown turning on its brightest women.
00:09The main thing that people became fascinated with was her sort of unraveling.
00:15Rose McGowan. The charmed actress was one of the first women in Hollywood
00:20to kickstart the hashtag Me Too movement.
00:22Casting couch, that's a nice little euphemism.
00:25She spoke out against now disgraced producer Harvey Weinstein,
00:28accusing him of sexual misconduct and was one of Time's silence breakers in 2017.
00:34In 2019, Rose claimed Weinstein had gone to diabolical lengths to smear her name
00:40and even hired private investigators from an organization called Black Cube to silence her.
00:46I think them coming after me spun my brain and still does
00:50in a way that's fractured a part of me that I don't think will ever fix.
00:54Not only did his reps try to buy out journalists, she alleged,
00:58but also did all they could to depict her as a publicity seeker looking for money.
01:03We are free, we are beautiful, we are strong, and you will never take that from us.
01:09Some media outlets even portrayed her as a woman out to destroy her male peers' careers
01:15when she accused Alexander Payne of sexually assaulting her as a minor.
01:19Katherine Heigl. From almost America's sweetheart to the most hated woman in Hollywood,
01:24this actress's career has been anything but easy.
01:27And just recently there was a Facebook Q&A. Someone asked you,
01:30I've heard rumors that you're very rude. What's your thoughts? And to your credit,
01:35you addressed it. You took on the question. What did you say?
01:38Good Lord, what did I say?
01:40Hollywood despised how she was openly critical of the industry she was in.
01:44She called Knocked Up sexist and spoke out against
01:47the cruel and mean working hours on the set of Grey's Anatomy.
01:50She was also publicly shamed for quitting contract negotiations with ABC
01:54over her pay for the show in 2007.
01:57Then she got hate for not submitting her work to the 2008 Emmys because she wasn't proud of it.
02:03There was a part of me that thought, because I had won the year before,
02:06that I needed juicy, dramatic, emotional material, and I just didn't have that that season.
02:11Eventually, as her difficult reputation worsened, her films started to tank at the box office.
02:17For a hot minute, the system succeeded in dimming her shine.
02:20Thankfully, that's not the case anymore.
02:23I'm a goddamn legend in the making.
02:25That's right you are.
02:27Angelina Jolie. Although highly praised for her acting skills,
02:30the maleficent actress has long been the subject of public scrutiny concerning her love life.
02:36You're not welcome here.
02:37Oh, dear. What an awkward situation.
02:51First, it was her short-lived marriage to Johnny Lee Miller,
02:54whom she almost ditched for actress Jenny Shimizu.
02:57Then she tied the knot with Billy Bob Thornton while he was engaged to Laura Dern.
03:02The biggest homewrecker accusation came when she got together with Brad Pitt.
03:07He apparently divorced Jennifer Aniston after falling in love with Jolie
03:10on the set of Mr. and Mrs. Smith.
03:12You think this story's gonna have a happy ending?
03:14Happy endings are stories that haven't finished yet.
03:17That marriage ended in an acrimonious divorce,
03:20involving accusations of child mistreatment against Brad, which he was cleared of.
03:25Regardless of what went on behind the scenes,
03:28Angelina was ripped to shreds and dubbed manipulative by the media.
03:32I think the mistake is the idea that there's a real side and a not real side,
03:35or a true side or a not true side. I think we just have many, many sides.
03:38Mira Sorvino
03:40This Oscar-winning actress is another one of Harvey Weinstein's victims
03:44who spoke out against him in 2017.
03:46She recalled being sexually harassed by him.
03:49It's a travesty that this sort of behavior
03:52is normalized and accepted for decades in this industry,
03:56and I am very pleased that this is all coming to light.
04:00Sorvino lived in fear for years afterwards,
04:03lest she be blacklisted for being a whistleblower.
04:06Months later, filmmaker Peter Jackson came forward to reveal that Weinstein's company,
04:11Miramax, directly influenced his casting for The Lord of the Rings trilogy,
04:15under New Line Cinema.
04:17While he had initially considered Sorvino for a role,
04:20Miramax had destroyed her reputation and convinced them to steer clear of her.
04:24When Sorvino discovered this truth,
04:26she said it only confirmed her suspicions, leaving her heartsick.
04:30Jackson called this the Miramax smear campaign in full swing.
04:34It's him finally facing real, real criminal consequences for his criminal behavior,
04:40and so for that I feel gratified.
04:44Amber Heard
04:44In 2016, Heard filed for divorce from husband Johnny Depp,
04:48alleging physical and verbal abuse.
04:51Two years later, in an article for The Washington Post,
04:54she detailed her experience with domestic violence.
04:56Not naming her ex-husband, Heard wrote she was a victim of domestic abuse.
05:01In 2019, Depp sued her for defamation.
05:04She countersued, claiming he had engineered an online smear campaign against her,
05:08to ruin her life and career.
05:10I don't deserve this. I want to move on.
05:14Heard's court filings also blamed him for instigating petitions to have her fired
05:19from Aquaman and losing her ambassadorship with L'Oreal.
05:23During the highly publicized trial, the actress took the stand to reveal
05:27she had been facing immense internet hate and threats to her life
05:31since coming forward about her alleged abuse.
05:33I receive hundreds of death threats regularly, if not daily.
05:41Thousands since this trial has started people mocking.
05:45Although she lost the case, the fact that she was trolled to no end was undeniable.
05:50Meghan Markle
05:51Before she married Prince Harry, the Suits actress was fairly popular.
05:54You have no idea.
05:56Today, however, she is one of the most polarizing public figures you'll find.
06:00Ever since she stepped into the British royal family, she's been chewed out by tabloids.
06:05From being accused of driving a wedge between her husband and Prince William,
06:09to allegations that she's overly controlling of her staff, rumors followed her everywhere.
06:14It wasn't just catty gossip.
06:16It was bringing out a part of people that was racist in how it was charged.
06:23When the Sussexes gave up their status as senior royals, it was again her who was criticized.
06:29For long, fans have believed that the negative stories about Meghan were maliciously planted.
06:34Her Cuts co-star Simon Rex even claimed he had been offered money
06:38by the British tabloids to lie about romancing her.
06:42Unfortunately, her situation hasn't changed much since.
06:45My hope for people in the takeaway from this is to know that there's another side.
06:56To know that life is worth living.
06:59Pamela Anderson
07:00These days, she is seen on red carpets completely makeup-free.
07:03Back in the 90s, she was a sex symbol on the cover of Playboy magazine,
07:07and the male gaze couldn't be happier.
07:10Gosh, what a beautiful tan you've got.
07:12You really do.
07:13Thanks.
07:14Oh, yes, yes.
07:16Well, I'm in the sun every day.
07:17Yet it was her sexuality that subjected her to exploitation at the hands of Hollywood.
07:22When an explicit tape of her and Tommy Lee,
07:24who she was married to at the time, was stolen and leaked,
07:27the Baywatch actress was instantly denounced.
07:30It was just accumulated, all this stress.
07:31We had a lot of stress.
07:32This really did not help our marriage.
07:35All the shaming by the media gaslit her into thinking less of herself.
07:39Meanwhile, unsurprisingly, Lee came out of the ordeal relatively scot-free
07:44and even celebrated.
07:46Marilyn Monroe
07:47For an actress who represents the epitome of Hollywood's Golden Age,
07:50the industry sure treated her with the most appalling cruelty.
07:54And if you had a daughter, wouldn't you rather she didn't marry a poor man?
07:58But I was...
07:58You'd want her to have the money.
08:00But I was...
08:00You'd want her to have the money.
08:01But I was...
08:02You'd want her to have the money.
08:03But I was...
08:04You'd want her to have the money.
08:04But I was...
08:05You'd want her to have the money.
08:06But I was...
08:07You'd want her to have the money.
08:08You'd want her to have the most wonderful things in the world and to be very happy.
08:12Oh, why is it wrong for me to want those things?
08:15Marilyn Monroe was not only sexualized for her entire career, but was also underpaid.
08:20She was a victim of the casting couch,
08:22and the media rarely saw her as anything more than a sexual object.
08:26Your picture has been on the cover of almost all popular magazines, hasn't it?
08:32No, not the Ladies Home Journal.
08:35That you would like, would you?
08:36Yes.
08:37They called her a dumb blonde who was allowed sexual expression
08:40only when she pandered to their fantasies.
08:43Otherwise, she was humiliated for the same,
08:45which showed in how her love life was publicized.
08:48Even her tragic death was marred by allegations of affairs
08:52with former U.S. President John F. Kennedy and his brother Robert F. Kennedy.
08:56Years later, Hollywood has made her into an I.P.
09:00You're in the papers so much.
09:03Well, not half as much as you, Marilyn.
09:08Who, me?
09:11Well, that's just studio publicity.
09:16Before we continue, be sure to subscribe to our channel
09:19and ring the bell to get notified about our latest videos.
09:22You have the option to be notified for occasional videos or all of them.
09:26If you're on your phone, make sure you go into your settings and switch on notifications.
09:32Britney Spears
09:33Stardom always spelled objectification for the toxic singer.
09:43The media made her virginity a headline.
09:46When she was revealed to have been intimate with Justin Timberlake,
09:49despite claiming she would wait for marriage, she was relentlessly shamed.
09:53Then, JT had a Britney lookalike portrayed as an
09:56adulteress in his music video for Crime Your River, prompting even more hate.
10:04Next came a failed marriage with Kevin Federline,
10:09with whom she had two kids she was losing custody of amid postpartum depression.
10:14The last straw was the passing of her aunt, Sandra, from cancer.
10:18Britney shaved her head and attacked a photographer's car with an umbrella.
10:22Do you think the paparazzi being around affected her at all?
10:27I don't really think and I don't really believe because,
10:31you know, working on her for so many years, she never gave a clue or information to us
10:38that I don't appreciate you guys. Leave me the F alone.
10:42Soon after, her father assumed her conservatorship,
10:45marking the start of a battle that only recently ended.
10:48Tonight, cheers erupting outside this courthouse in Los Angeles.
10:52Do you think the Hollywood smear machine is still as powerful today as it once was?
10:56Sound off in the comments.
10:58Rage was coming out of me. I thought, whoa, whoa, whoa, where's that coming from?