Olivia Munn revealed that a disagreement with a male director on the set of "The Newsroom" ended with a smear campaign.
The actor opened up about the ordeal during an appearance on Dax Shepherd's "Armchair Expert" podcast.
"There was a storyline where my character and Tom Sadoski's character are dating and falling in love," Munn said, according to Deadline. "[The director] kept trying to force me to carry that storyline only on my side. He's like, 'Can you look out at him and smile?' And I'm like, 'Why? She's busy doing this.' Or 'Can you stop and snuggle up to him or flirt with him?' Or 'Can you give him a kiss?' And I'm like, 'This is in the middle of working.'"
Munn later found out that the unnamed director had described her to a film studio as difficult to work with.
"I was on the 1-yard line for the movie, and my manager calls me and says, 'Hey, you're gonna get the role. But first, I guess there's another director who they know, and he says that on 'The Newsroom' you were late all the time and really combative,'" Munn recalled. "I lived seven minutes from there. I was never late. I was like, 'I know who this is.'"
She continued, "He just was trying to bash me. And I told my reps, 'Please tell the directors this.' And then I still got the role. But I will always remember that just because of our conflicts of how we approached a role, he wanted to ruin my chances of getting anything else."
Helmed by Aaron Sorkin, HBO's "The Newsroom" premiered in 2012 and ran for three seasons, featuring Munn as economist Sloan Sabbith. The cast also included Jeff Daniels, Emily Mortimer, John Gallagher Jr., Alison Pill, Thomas Sadoski, Dev Patel, and Sam Waterston, according to the New York Post.
Sorkin shut down the idea of a reboot during a 2019 appearance on "The Late Late Show with James Corden."
"I wish the show was on the air now. I would love to be writing it now. But there are other things coming up. I have no plans to return," he said at the time.
Zoe Papadakis ✉
Zoe Papadakis is a Newsmax writer based in South Africa with two decades of experience specializing in media and entertainment. She has been in the news industry as a reporter, writer and editor for newspapers, magazine and websites.
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