Harvey's disputes require two A-list litigators: Bert Fields in Los Angeles and David Boies in New York.
Harvey Weinstein may make popular award-winning films, but in a new op-ed, the producer, whose My Week With Marilyn (directed by Simon Curtis and starring Michelle Williams) opened Nov. 25, reveals that there are a few people who can make him feel out of touch: his three eldest daughters, Ruthie, Lily and Emma and his mother, Miriam.
The King’s Speech producer meets his girls at a restaurant every week for a meal and conversation. They’ve dubbed it “the council of foreign relations” because, he says it’s a meeting between his “very hip, very cool daughters and their very unhip, uncool dad.”
PHOTOS: The Lost Marilyn Monroe Photos
In the piece for the Huffington Post, Weinstein writes about a particular meal that his mom also attended. During the meal, he was telling the girls of his plans to make a film about Marilyn Monroe.
“As I went around the room, looking for a thumbs up, I saw their faces reluctant to give it to me,” says Weinstein. “So I pulled out the trump card. Michelle Williams. Now my girls are lucky enough to know Michelle Williams and they know her daughter too. She is as sweet to my daughters as she is to her own. When a hair colorist had made a mistake on one of the girls, Michelle did an operation worthy of Bond, James Bond, and got it all sorted and fixed. In my house, that made her a folk hero. And that proved to be the closer.”
PHOTOS: The Making of ‘My Week With Marilyn’
He also details the film’s exclusive filming locations, hinting that there may have been some help from the royals.
“Simon Curtis wanted to immerse the film in reality so we shot it at the locations that it took place in in real life,” he writes. “So Windsor Castle was Windsor Castle. The Aristocratic British School for Boys was Eaton. No one ever gets to film in these locations, yet magic strings were pulled and red tape disappeared. The rumor was that somehow the royal family pulled those strings. In 1956 Marilyn Monroe met the Queen at a royal premiere. You can watch some of this footage on YouTube. They had a wonderful rapport and it was reported in all the British newspapers that they got along famously. The irony of Marilyn meeting the Queen was that they were the same age as the Queen. Imagine, Marilyn in her 80s.”
PHOTOS: Behind the Scenes of THR’s Actress Roundtable 2011
After screening the finished film for his girls and mother, Weinstein said he got the ultimate compliment: he was cooler for having made it.
“The epilogue to the story, is that two weeks ago, Katy Perry saw the film and tweeted about how much she liked it,” he reveals. “When I told my girls she wanted to meet me they said, “you’re not cool enough to meet Katy Perry,” and that they should go in my place. As a father of four daughters, I’ve learned that COOL is a gift that only comes occasionally, but for a short time, Marilyn Monroe made dad cool.”
