David O. Russell Has Thoughts About Jennifer Lawrence’s Wage Gap Essay

October 24, 2015 / Posted by:

Last week, professional cool cousin Jennifer Lawrence wrote a long essay for Lenny about how pissed off she was about the Hollywood wage gap. Thanks to the Sony hack, JLaw discovered that the numbers on her paycheck for American Hustle were a lot smaller than those of the guys she worked with, and that made JLaw frown harder than the time she released a massive pizza burp and there was no one around to hear it. Now the director of American Hustle and JLaw’s upcoming film Joy, David O. Russell, is chiming in with his thoughts. Because just like their dramatic on-set screaming matches, David O. Russell always has to get the last word.

David spoke to The Hollywood Reporter earlier this week about JLaw’s piece on wage inequality, and…he sort of comes across a little smug. Or maybe that’s just the default setting in my brain whenever it reads something about David O. Russell? (See: every time David O. Russell comes across as an asshole-type). But I do know this: He does use a lot of words to say whatever he’s trying to say.

“I always support all my actors and all their opinions, and I want them all to get what they need. I don’t really talk about the minutia of what goes on in my movies, but I believe the spirit of what Jennifer is saying is truthful to her heart. I support her and all women in that. I understand what she’s saying, and I think people in the business do too, and I also understand people saying, ‘Well, let’s talk about the minutia of the deal.’ It’s hard to make a movie come together with a lot of big stars. American Hustle had a lot of big stars in it. We all contributed to help make it happen.”

“But I also respect that Jennifer is finding her voice, and I think it’s in service of something very important. Jennifer’s character in Joy is about the same thing: maturity, learning what it is to have your own space and express your own voice and to have power. And that’s what she’s learning.”

Then THR asked David O. if JLaw forwarded him a copy of her essay before she hit publish, to which he laughed, then added:

“Jennifer does what Jennifer feels like doing, and we say, ‘There you go, girl!'”

I guess “There you go, girl!” is David O. Russell’s version of Christian Bale’sOh, goOoOoOod for you!“?

Jeremy Renner also chimed in with his thoughts on JLaw’s wage gap piece (again), but this time it was to say that his words were taken out of context and he supports wage equality and bla bla bla.

But let’s go back to that “I believe the spirit of what Jennifer is saying is truthful to her heart” part for a second. The angel on my shoulder is telling me that David O. was giving JLaw a sincere compliment. However, the sassy devil on my shoulder just popped an imaginary umbrella and is pretending to twirl it while cackling: “Put away your SPF Jennifer, because today’s forecast calls for SHADE.” And because I like the sassy devil better, I’m going to believe his comment was meant as shade.

With that being said, I think the next time someone comes at me with an untruth, I’m going to pull a David O. Russell. “What’s that, Michael K? You haven’t spent the past 26 hours staring at the outline of Prince Harry’s dick? Uh huh, okay, well I believe the spirit of what you are saying is truthful to your heart.

Pic: Splash/INF

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