Actress-director Rebecca Hall has expressed "regret" over her past apology for working with #MeToo accused Woody Allen. Hall worked with Allen twice, once on Vicky Cristina Barcelona, a film that came out in 2008, and another in 2019 for A Rainy Day in New York.
While she only had a day's worth of a role in the latter, she came out in 2018, at the height of the #MeToo movement, to express remorse over having worked with him. In an Instagram post at the time, she said:
"I see, not only how complicated this matter is, but that my actions have made another woman feel silenced and dismissed. I regret this decision and wouldn’t make the same one today.”
Back in 2018, Allen's adopted daughter, Dylan Farrow, whom he shared with Hollywood icon Mia Farrow, accused him of molesting her as a child.
Rebecca Hall says she wouldn't do anything about Woody Allen today, she would just be "an artist"
In speaking with the Guardian on Sunday, Rebecca Hall went back on her words:
"I struggle with this one. It’s very unlike me to make a public statement about anything. I make the stuff, that’s how I am political. I don’t think of myself as an ‘actor-vist’, I’m not that person. And, I kind of regret making that statement, because I don’t think it’s the responsibility of his actors to speak to that situation."
She recounted an instance during filming when she was “outside, shooting a street scene with Jude Law where, literally, my dialogue was, ‘You’ve got to stop sleeping with these f****** 15-year-olds.’ And that day, the Weinstein scandal breaks."
She went on:
"There’s a bank of journalists and paparazzi right there, because Weinstein’s a producer on it, and they’re all listening to me say this. Like, in this moment, it’s the most important thing to believe the women. Yes, of course, there’s going to be complications and nuances in these stories, but we’re redressing a balance here. So I felt like I wanted to do something definitive."
At the time, Rebecca Hall bequeathed her salary to the Time’s Up Legal Defense Fund. But, she says,
"It just became, ‘another person denounces Woody Allen and regrets working with him’, which is not what I said actually. I don’t regret working with him. He gave me a great job opportunity and he was kind to me. I don’t talk to him any more, but I don’t think that we should be the ones who are doing judge and jury on this.”
She was then probed about how she would react had the allegations come out today, to which she said:
"I wouldn’t say anything – my policy actually is to be an artist. Don’t come out and state your stuff so much. I don’t think that makes me apathetic or not engaged. I just think it’s my job.”
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Back in 2018, Rebecca Hall reflected on what it was like to work on Rainy Day. She noted that it was just "one day in her hometown -- easy." However, she "subsequently realized there is nothing easy about any of this." In the following weeks, she noted, she "thought very deeply about this decision, and remain conflicted and saddened."
Rebecca Hall then added that she felt burdened by her actions, as they silenced another victim, and issued a formal apology.
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