.Gary Dretzka
.Leonard Klady.
.David Poland
.Ray Pride

March 17, 2003

In Praise Of Harvey Weinstein

Those Movie City News sperm jockeys spend a lot of time riding their high horses and opening fire on Miramax.  It is time for the only egg-carrying columnist in this endeavor to change the channel on the radio while the boys are busy behind the wheel, getting us lost.

It is true that Miramax is helping edge the Oscars closer and closer to the Golden Globes. Harvey Weinstein is a complex man of big appetites.  That hunger has made movies better also. 

Who else could have made Chicago into a $160 million hit?  Who else could have made Gangs of New York into an $80 million success?  When Harvey falls in love, nobody does it better.  He is the Don Juan of the movie business. 

If it weren’t for Harvey Weinstein, no one would believe that Michael Jackson actually had a penis.  (Y’all saw The Crying Game!)  John Travolta would be on Celebrity Mole instead of flying a fleet of planes.  Quentin Tarantino would be a video clerk known as “Captain Kung Fu” on Ain’t It Cool News.  Steven Spielberg would have more Best Picture Oscars than Kevin Costner.  The Fiennes Brothers would still be playing dinner theaters.  Tina Brown would still matter.  And Kevin Smith would have lost his mind and started a website called Movie Poop Shoot!

Harv may also be the Casanova of the movies, floating from one movie to another, release dates lasting for 30 good minutes then taking their clothes and leaving $20 on the bedside table for prints and advertising.  He keeps falling in love, but never for long.  Maybe those movies are better for the romance as well.  Did Harvey show enough love to The Quiet American or Rabbit-Proof Fence?  Who else would have given them even the platform they got?

Girls will agree.  Harvey is the kind of lover we all want.  He’s passionate.  He’s relentless.  He won’t stop trying until he’s gotten his reward.  The size thing is a little over-rated, but girth wins the war. 

Look at the other movies.  Harvey is, for starters, straight, unlike Mr. Rudin.  He is single, unlike Mr. Jackson.  He speaks good English and has never been accused of raping a child.  You get the feeling he’d be fun to hug, even if you’d have to remove his thick hand from your hind quarters two or three times during every dance.

Harvey is the ultimate loveable rogue.  He is like the old-fashioned studio moguls.  If you close your eyes while watching The Godfather, you can imagine Harvey giving the speech about the girl that Mr. Woltz gives.  “Just to tell you I’m not a hard man, she was also the greatest piece of ass I ever had!”  All the while, he’d be spitting and mewing! 

It is crude, but there is something charming about crude when all the other kingpins are being so politically correct.  That does not mean that I would get near Bill Maher if he were the last reptile on earth.  But there is some kind of sweetness about Harvey’s crudeness.  Have you noticed that none of the “Miramax Girls” have breast implants?  Or even breasts!  He seems to like women who look like little boys!

Given the chance to be a huge supporter of Salma Hayek, Harvey chose concentration camp victim Renee Zellweger instead.  (Maybe all of those ads where she looks like Adrien Brody’s hungry sister in a sequin gown are meant to be anti-Pianist.)  He left poor Cathy Jones to her own devices and she ended up getting knocked up by some other old guy.  He’s probably happy that Queen Latifah is doing well, but you never see him and her bust in the same photograph. (Saturday Night Live Scoreboard: Latifah 1, Salma 0.)

This is my only fear about getting along with Harvey.  My legs aren’t that long and I have eaten more than one meal a day and two IV drips a day for years now.  But he can learn.  Any man who loves himself that much must get hot while looking at a slim reflection. 

My Harvey is a feminist.  He likes Hilary Clinton and Meryl Poster and Barbra Streisand too.  He must be pro-choice, since he aborts half of his movies! 

The best of Harvey’s movies all have a part of him in them.  He is Billy Flynn from Chicago.  He is Henslow in Shakespeare in Love.  He is The Wolf in Pulp Fiction and Joe Cabot in Reservoir Dogs combined.  He is Little Ze in City of God.  He is Boss Tweed in Gangs of New York. 

I simply cannot imagine whom else in charge of Hollywood I am supposed to have a crush on!  Sherry Lansing, Amy Pascal and Stacey Snider are all pretty cute, but I gave up that kind of thing after my sophomore year at Vassar.  Walter Parkes looks like Laurie MacDonald irons his clothes with him in them.  Jim Gianopolis & Tom Rothman would have to share me and that is no good.  Dick Cook’s name would make me giggle. 

So Harvey gets my heart.  Even if he would eat it with some fava beans and a nice Chianti. 

My next column is due on Oscar night.  Then I can start focusing on more important things, like Boat Trip and A View From The Top, for y’all’s amusement. 

Ciao for now.

Email Patricia Vidal