Richard Dreyfuss went on a sexist and homophobic rant at a 'Jaws' screening in Massachusetts over the weekend, sparking outrage among patrons and prompting an apology from the theater.
On Saturday, The Cabot theater in Beverly, Massachusetts, held an event titled “An Evening With Richard Dreyfuss + Jaws Screening," but according to people on social media, many attendees left before the screening began.
According to posts made on X, formerly Twitter, Dreyfuss began his tirade while talking about Barbra Streisand, and somehow segued into railing on trans youth and the Academy's new inclusion rules.
People also expressed clarity, after their initial confusion, about Dreyfuss entering the stage for the Q&A session wearing a dress.
While footage showing what happened has yet to make its way to social media, people online shared their experiences.
One person tweeted a screenshot that said:
"It started out ugly."
"He took the stage in a dress (which torn off by himself with the help of two stage hands) and did some idiotic dance for some unbeknownst reason, but then that reason became clear as he spoke throughout the interview."
"He was intentionally mocking trans people. He was openly antagonistic by being purposefully 'politically incorrect' at an even which was clearly designed to celebrate his time, and his accomplishments in Hollywood, and any negativity was entirely brought on by himself."
Another person shared a text from an attendee that read:
"Went off the rails talking about how Barbra Streisand is a genius but he didn't listen to her because she is a woman and women shouldn't have that power."
"Then [he] started sharing his views on the me too movement and started down the road on how you shouldn't be listening to some 10 year old who says they want to be a boy instead of a girl... Jesus Christ what an explosion."
"Crowd was shouting at him and most walked out before the movie even started. Talk about the movie, a**hole... We never made it to that."
Quoting Dreyfuss, the text continued:
"She [sic] brilliant but an idiot, you know women are so passive that's why the movie sucked."
They also added that Dreyfuss called Steven Spielberg "a genius but an idiot," and claimed Close Encounters of the Third Kind "only worked" because Dreyfuss "convinced" Spielberg to hire him instead of Gene Hackman for the film.
@kleemcadams/X
On a Facebook post promoting upcoming events at the theater, one person who was at the screening wrote:
"We walked out of his interview tonight along with hundred of others because of his racist homophobic misogynistic rant."
The Cabot/Facebook
One video showed the actor responding to a question about his 2022 bookOne Thought Scares Me…We Teach Our Children What We Wish Them to Know; We Don’t Teach Our Children What We Don’t Wish Them to Know, in which he shared:
"It’s about the fact that 50 years ago, without telling anybody, they took civics out of the curriculum of all public schools in America, which means we have no knowledge of who the hell we are.”
“And if we don’t get it back soon, we’re all going to die. Make sure your kids are not the last generation of Americans."
"And you know exactly what I’m talking about.”
People on social media were appalled.
Many, however, were not all that surprised.
In response to Dreyfuss' bigoted rant and subsequent outrage from the community, The Cabot issued an apology.
Per The Hollywood Reporter, it began:
“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.“
It continued:
"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."
The apology concluded:
"We are in active dialogue with our patrons about their experience and are committed to learning from this event how to better enact our mission of entertaining, educating and inspiring our community.”
This is just the latest example of Dreyfuss' unapologetic bigotry.
Just last May, the actor appeared on PBS' Firing Line and went on a tirade about the Academy's inclusion requirements for Best Picture nominees, sounding off:
“They make me vomit. This is an art form. It’s also a form of commerce and it makes money, but it’s an art."
“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."
"What are we risking? Are we really risking hurting people’s feelings? You can’t legislate that."
"You have to let life be life and I’m sorry, I don’t think there is a minority or a majority in the country that has to be catered to like that."
You can hear the rest of his comments in the clip below.
Maybe it's time to stop inviting him to speak.
