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Topics: News, US News, Celebrity, Film and TV
Kit Roberts
Topics: News, US News, Celebrity, Film and TV
Members of the audience 'walked out' of a Jaws screening with star Richard Dreyfuss due to the star's alleged remarks.
The 76-year-old appeared at a Q&A at the Cabot Theatre in Massachusetts on May 25 about the making of 1975 movie Jaws - in which he famously played marine biologist, Matt Hooper.
The event also included a screening of the film.
However, audience members reportedly walked out of the venue due to the actor allegedly going on a 'racist homophobic misogynist rant', one attendee alleged.
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Those who went to the event, as reported by The Boston Globe, claimed that Dreyfuss quickly 'went off the rails' into a bigoted speech on various topics, including the MeToo movement, LGBTQ+ rights, and women in film.
Sarah Hogg, who went with their partner Jonah Hoffman, said they were 'thrilled to see Richard Dreyfuss speak about his experience filming ‘Jaws', but ultimately that 'is not at all the experience that we got'.
After alleged misogynistic comments about women in Hollywood from Dreyfuss, Hogg said: "Then it just got so quickly off the rails.”
A video from the event sees the American Graffiti star walk onto the stage in a breakaway dress to a Taylor Swift's 'Love Story'.
According to fellow attendee Diane Wolf, Dreyfuss allegedly said that 'the parents of trans youth, allowing them to transition, was bad parenting and that someday those kids might change their minds' - at which point, Hogg say they left the theatre with their partner, along with others.
As per Sky News, another attendee wrote on Facebook: "We walked out of his interview tonight along with hundred of others because of his racist homophobic misogynistic rant."
On May 27, the venue apologised in a statement for what had occurred, saying the alleged remarks made by Dreyfuss 'do not reflect the values of inclusivity and respect that we uphold as an organization'.
They said: “We are aware of, and share serious concerns, following the recent event with Richard Dreyfuss prior to a screening of the film Jaws at The Cabot.
"The views expressed by Mr. Dreyfuss do not reflect the values of inclusivity and respect that we uphold as an organization.
"We deeply regret the distress that this has caused to many of our patrons. We regret that an event that was meant to be a conversation to celebrate an iconic movie instead became a platform for political views.
“We take full responsibility for the oversight in not anticipating the direction of the conversation and for the discomfort it caused to many patrons.”
Their statement concluded that they were in 'active dialogue' with patrons and are 'committed to learning from this event how to better enact our mission of entertaining, educating and inspiring our community'.
It's not the first time that Dreyfuss has made remarks which have caused controversy.
In an interview on PBS' Firing Line, the Close Encounters of The Third Kind star criticised the inclusion and diversity policies at the Oscars, saying: "They [diversity and inclusion rules] make me vomit. Because this is an art form.
"It's also a form of commerce, and it makes money. But it's an art.
"And no one should be telling me as an artist that I have to give in to the latest, most current idea of what morality is."
UNILAD has reached out to Dreyfuss's representatives for comment.