Paula Jones Doesn’t Love The Portrayal Of Her On “Impeachment: American Crime Story”

Annaleigh Ashford plays Paula Jones on Ryan Murphy’s latest historical wigstravaganza for the FX network, Impeachment: American Crime Story. Annaleigh recently spoke to Vanity Fair about her portrayal, and explained that it was very important to her that her performance be rooted in truth, and didn’t want to be an “impression” or a “caricature.” Well, if you ask Paula Jones herself, which Inside Edition did, she will tell you in no uncertain terms that Annaleigh’s version of her is cartoonish, insulting, inaccurate, and deeply offensive. To add insult to crunchy-banged injury, Paula is also very mad that Annaleigh never once called her before slipping into a scrunchie and vocal twang.

Paula Jones was pulled into the beginning of Bill Clinton’s impeachment scandal after she sued him for sexual harassment in 1994. Paula and her then-husband Steve Jones are played by Annaleigh and Taran Killam. Their characters are – how can I put this delicately – very accent-based. I knew from the first trailer that we were bound to get some scenes that gave off some major achy breaky yee-haw vibes. And according to Impeachment‘s first episode, Paula tried to leverage her sexual harassment claims against Bill Clinton in exchange for a public apology for herself and a potential role on Designing Women for Steve who was trying to get into acting. But apparently, that never happened. via People magazine:

In a recent interview with Inside Edition, Jones criticized Impeachment as “inaccurate” in how it portrays her.

“The part that I saw about me, most of it was inaccurate,” she said. “It was almost cartoonish-y.” Jones specifically mentioned a scene in which her husband asks for a role on a TV show amid the lawsuit. “That is so far from the truth,” she told Inside Edition of the scene.

She also said that she was never contacted by anyone from the series. “How can they portray somebody accurately if they don’t even call them?” Jones said.

Paula also had words for the show’s main protagonist, Monica Lewinsky. We all know that Ryan Murphy said he didn’t feel right about making Impeachment without Monica’s involvement because he thought it was important she be able to reclaim her story for herself. She’s been a big part of the production and the making of the series. Paula isn’t so enthusiastic about the way Monica has so far been portrayed (by Beanie Feldstein). It’s always Monica, Monica, Monica! via People:

“I find it funny that Monica can have a relationship in the Oval Office, under the Oval desk, yet…people want to hear her story,” she continued about Lewinsky, who served as a co-producer on the series. “It makes no sense to me. I have always been shunned and made fun of.”

Of course, no one called Paula first. Nobody had the time! Everyone was too busy deciding which tone of blue to aggressively soak every scene in. Midnight? Cobalt? What about pale navy? Seriously, this show looks like it takes in Atlantis’ version of Washington.

Pic: FX