Rose McGowan calls Natalie Portman’s Oscars 2020 dress ‘deeply offensive’
Rose McGowan was not a fan of Natalie Portman‘s silent act of protest on Sunday’s Oscars 2020 red carpet.
The actress and Harvey Weinstein accuser, 46, called out Portman in a lengthy Facebook post on Tuesday, accusing her of not taking the actions to support women in the industry.
Portman, 38, attended the awards show wearing a black and gold Dior dress with a cape embroidered with the names of the female directors who were snubbed by the Academy: Lorene Scafaria (“Hustlers”), Lulu Wang (“The Farewell”), Greta Gerwig (“Little Women”), Mati Diop (“Atlantics”), Marianne Heller (“A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood”), Melina Matsoukas (“Queen & Slim”), Alma Har’el (“Honey Boy”) and Céline Sciamma (“Portrait of a Lady on Fire”).
“I find Portman’s type of activism deeply offensive to those of us who actually do the work. I’m not writing this out of bitterness, I am writing out of disgust. I just want her and other actresses to walk the walk,” McGowan said. “Natalie, you have worked with two female directors in your very long career- one of them was you. You have a production company that has hired exactly one female director- you.”
“What is it with actresses of your ilk? You ‘A-listers’ (🤮) could change the world if you’d take a stand instead of being the problem. Yes, you, Natalie. You are the problem. Lip service is the problem. Fake support of other women is the problem.”
McGowan also recalled a Women in Film event that she attended, at which Portman “reeled off depressing statistics and then we all went back to our salads.” She called the female speakers “frauds,” referring to the organization itself as a “joke.” McGowan also plugged her book, “Brave,” in which she details multiple alleged sexual assaults by Weinstein, whom she only refers to as “the monster.”
Portman has been outspoken against abuse and manipulation in the industry, and supports the Time’s Up movement.
“I am singling you out because you are the latest in a long line of actresses who are acting the part of a woman who cares about other women,” McGowan wrote. “Actresses who supposedly stand for women, but in reality do not do much at all.”
“Until you and your fellow actresses get real, do us all a favor and hang up your embroidered activist cloak, it doesn’t hang right,” she concluded.
Though some supported McGowan in the comments, plenty also scolded her for the harsh critique. “You don’t get to decide what her effort means or say what she’s feeling. You don’t get to tear another woman down,” one person said.
“Just because you believe one is the right way to protest does not mean she is in the wrong. I thought you were about uplifting woman and standing together?,” another wrote.