You know, usually when actors give interviews to promote their films that are coming out, you get some predictable pablum and maybe a funny anecdote or two about the stars playing practical jokes on each other behind the scenes. Maybe, maybe someone rags on the director a bit.
It’s part of the game Hollywood and the media play with each other.
It’s much rarer to hear an actor take the opportunity of a press junket to confess to homicidal impulses, however. So it’s no wonder Liam Neeson has been in the headlines recently.
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Even Liam knew as he said it that he was confessing to something terrible.
The Independent ‘s Clémence Michallon recalled Neeson’s breath trembling as he spoke, recounting a real-life revenge fantasy that he played out for a week after learning that a friend of his had been raped. Sitting there with his co-star, Tony Bateman, he recalled how he trolled the streets at night with a club, “hoping some ‘black bastard’ would come out of a pub and have a go at me about something, you know? So that I could kill him.”
“Neeson clearly knows what he’s saying,” Clémence wrote, “and how shocking it is, how appalling.”
At that point, nobody was thinking about the film, Cold Pursuit — only that this huge film star has admitted to something he knows is “horrible” and “awful” as he tried to explain how he connected to his revenge-driven character in the film. Needless to say, the comments generated countless headlines after the interview was published, overshadowing the film.
The story took on a life of its own, as these things do.
Defenders, like Whoopi Goldberg , rushed to his side, while everyone else called for boycotts of his films — some even calling for him to be digitally removed from the upcoming Men in Black film — red carpet appearances were canceled , and an interview with Stephen Colbert was scrapped .
Whoopi Goldberg explained her position on The View.
“People walk around sometimes with rage, that’s what happens. Is he a bigot? No. I’ve known him a pretty long time, I think I would have recognised, I’ve been around a lot of real bigots. I can say this man is not one,” she said .
Co-star Michelle Rodriguez also chimed in with an interesting defense of Neeson.
At the amfAR Gala New York she said that, ““It’s all f% (*#& b#) @$#. Liam Neeson is not a racist.” She added that, “Dude, have you watched Widows ? His tongue was so far down Viola Davis’s throat.”
“You can’t call him a racist ever,” she continued.
“Racists don’t make out with the race that they hate, especially in the way he does with his tongue—so deep down her throat. I don’t care how good of an actor you are.”
After interviewing Neeson and before going to publication, Clémence says she tried to reach out for some follow-up questions.
No doubt she had many, and those press junket interviews are often time-pressed. But Neeson’s people declined to provide any further answers, so her article went to press without a Neeson clarifying, expanding on, or in any way explaining what is most certainly the most damning statement of his career.
However, the headlines her interview got ended up requiring some damage control, Neeson took on another interview that would probably answer some of Clémence’s follow-up questions.
Sitting down with Robin Roberts on Good Morning America , Neeson told her flat-out, “I’m not a racist.” He did, however, admit to feeling a “primal urge to lash out” after learning his friend had been raped.
“I went out deliberately into black areas in the city, looking to be set upon,” he said. “It shocked me and it hurt me…I did seek help, I went to see a priest.”
“Luckily no violence occurred,” he said, because in that state, anything could have happened.
He also explained that if his friend had said a white man had attacked her, he would have sought out someone matching that description. Either way, however, he has always maintained that he was in the wrong, saying “It was horrible, horrible, when I think back, that I did that.”
Robin asked Neeson what he thought people should or could learn from his revelation.
“To talk, to open up, to talk about these things,” he said. “We all pretend we’re politically correct. I mean, in this country, and same in my own country too, you sometimes just scratch the surface and you discover this racism and this bigotry, and it’s there.”
It seems unlikely that any real dialogue will happen on the heels of Neeson’s admission, however.
Folks online have made up their minds, no matter what he says. By and large, either they aren’t buying what he’s selling or at least think that his confession was brave.
Brooklyn Nine-Nine star Terry Crews chimed in that what Neeson felt was only human.
“I believe that every person on earth is capable of the greatest good, or unspeakable evil,” he posted on Twitter, “Liam is just describing his fork in the road.”
Crews has been open about his #MeToo experience , so probably appreciates honesty in all forms, especially when it looks bad for the person admitting to a mistake.
Whether you think Neeson is a racist because of this story or not, honesty is always good.
Hiding our mistakes just allows others to make the same ones, but sharing them allows everyone to learn. Especially when the mistakes are being made by someone with as large a platform as a Hollywood celebrity.
