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      in Music

      Trinity Church Fires Conductor After Misconduct Accusation

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      The conductor, Julian Wachner, denied the allegation that he sexually assaulted a woman in 2014. The church said it had not verified the accusation, but fired him for behavior “inconsistent with our expectations.”Trinity Wall Street, the powerful New York church, said on Monday that it had fired its music director after receiving an allegation of sexual misconduct against him.On Saturday, Trinity said it had placed Julian Wachner, its acclaimed director of music and the arts, on leave as it investigated the allegation, which stemmed from a 2014 incident. But in a statement on Monday, the church’s rector, the Rev. Phillip A. Jackson, said that the church had fired Mr. Wachner.“The investigation is ongoing, and thus the investigator has not yet made any determination about the veracity of the 2014 allegations,” the church’s statement said. “Still, we have concluded based on recent information that Julian has otherwise conducted himself in a manner that is inconsistent with our expectations of anyone who occupies a leadership position. For this reason, Trinity has decided to end Julian’s employment with Trinity as of today.”The allegation was made by a former Juilliard School employee, Mary Poole. Ms. Poole said in an interview with The New York Times that during a music festival in Aiken, S.C., in 2014, Mr. Wachner pushed her against a wall, groped her and kissed her, and that he ignored her demands that he stop.Mr. Wachner denies the accusations. His lawyer, Andrew T. Miltenberg, said in an email on Monday: “We are exceptionally disappointed that Trinity has acted prior to completing a thorough investigation. Depriving Mr. Wachner of the benefit of the full narrative is the antithesis of due process and allows distortions to triumph over the truth.”Two people interviewed by The Times — a friend of Ms. Poole’s and a former colleague — recalled hearing Ms. Poole describe the details of the encounter with Mr. Wachner at the time. Ms. Poole said she did not report the incident to the police since she was in another state and pressed for time in the middle of a tour. She did report the incident to Juilliard, which said on Saturday that it was aware of “unacceptable conduct” by Mr. Wachner in 2014 and that it had not hired him again.Mr. Miltenberg, Mr. Wachner’s lawyer, said on Monday that “Juilliard’s statement, which Mr. Wachner saw for the first time in The New York Times, is flawed and erroneous.” He added that “Mr. Wachner continues to dispute the nearly decade-old, misleading and untrue allegations made against him.”In an interview on Monday, Ms. Poole praised Trinity’s decision to fire Mr. Wachner, adding that it was important that the church lead a thorough investigation into his behavior.“I hope this is the beginning of a bigger conversation about how we handle harassment in classical music, and how conductors are often held on a pedestal,” she said. “Everybody needs to be held accountable for the same kind of appropriate behavior in the workplace.”A conductor and composer, Mr. Wachner oversaw Trinity’s critically praised choir, Baroque orchestra and contemporary-music ensemble, which together present hundreds of events each year. These forces have perhaps been best known for their annual performances of Handel’s “Messiah”; in 2018, The Times credited Mr. Wachner with leading “the best ‘Messiah’ in New York.”In recent months, he has emerged as one of three finalists to serve as the next artistic director of the renowned Oregon Bach Festival. The festival has not responded to requests for comment. More

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      in Music

      Trinity Church’s Conductor Put on Leave Amid Investigation

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      Julian Wachner has been accused of sexually assaulting a Juilliard School employee during a music festival in 2014. He denies the accusation.Trinity Wall Street, one of New York’s wealthiest and most powerful churches, said on Saturday that it was placing its high-profile director of music on leave as it investigates an allegation of sexual misconduct against him.The director, Julian Wachner, a highly-regarded conductor, composer and keyboardist who has been a fixture at the church for more than a decade, has been accused by a former Juilliard employee, Mary Poole, of sexual assault. Ms. Poole said in an interview with The New York Times that during a music festival in 2014, Mr. Wachner pushed her against a wall, groped her and kissed her, and that he ignored her demands that he stop. Mr. Wachner denies the accusations.In a statement to The Times on Saturday, Trinity did not mention Ms. Poole by name but said the church first learned of “allegations of sexual misconduct” against Mr. Wachner last month from social media. Ms. Poole recently posted a detailed account of her encounter with Mr. Wachner on her social media accounts, saying, “I was totally violated.”Trinity said it had hired outside counsel to investigate. “Julian was placed on administrative leave on March 1 and will remain on leave during the investigation,” the church said in its statement. “Trinity takes these allegations very seriously.”Mr. Wachner, through an attorney, denied the accusations.“We respect Trinity’s decision to conduct a thorough investigation,” said the attorney, Andrew T. Miltenberg. “Ms. Poole’s outrageous allegations are categorically false and my client looks forward to the matter being resolved. Due to the ongoing nature of the investigation we cannot comment further at this time.”Ms. Poole helped organize a 2014 Juilliard festival in Aiken, S.C., that featured Mr. Wachner and the acclaimed Trinity choir. In the interview, Ms. Poole said that one evening, at a house where Juilliard staff members were staying, Mr. Wachner asked her to get him a drink. While she was preparing the drink in the kitchen, she said, he began to grope and kiss her for almost two minutes, even as she told him repeatedly to stop.Two people interviewed by The Times — a friend of Ms. Poole’s and a former colleague — recalled hearing Ms. Poole describe the details of the encounter with Mr. Wachner at the time. Ms. Poole said she did not report the incident to the police, since she was in another state and pressed for time in the middle of a tour.In the interview, Ms. Poole, who was 24 at the time, said that she felt powerless in dealing with Mr. Wachner, an influential figure in the classical music industry. “I felt like I could not defend myself,” she said, adding that at the time she worried she might suffer professional consequences if she spoke up. She said that she still has panic attacks that she attributes to the encounter.Ms. Poole reported the incident to Juilliard, which vowed not to hire Mr. Wachner again.In a statement on Saturday, Juilliard said it was aware of “unacceptable conduct” by Wachner in 2014.“Sexual misconduct or discrimination are not tolerated at Juilliard, and we take all allegations very seriously,” the school said in a statement. “At the time we offered our full support to Ms. Poole and informed Mr. Wachner that he would not be invited back to Juilliard in the future. Since that time we have had no relationship with Mr. Wachner.”Trinity, one of the city’s wealthiest churches, has a portfolio of office buildings, stock investments and residential development worth $6 billion — and a critically acclaimed music program.As director of music and the arts, Wachner oversees the church’s choir, its Baroque orchestra and its contemporary ensemble, which together present hundreds of events each year. He is perhaps best known for his annual performances of Handel’s “Messiah” — in 2018, The Times credited him with leading “the best ‘Messiah’ in New York.” He has been nominated for Grammy Awards and has collaborated with leading organizations, including Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center and the Los Angeles Opera.In recent months, Wachner has emerged as one of three finalists to serve as the next artistic director of the renowned Oregon Bach Festival. The festival did not respond to a request for comment on Saturday. More

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      in Television

      Supreme Court Will Not Review Decision to Overturn Bill Cosby’s Conviction

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      Prosecutors had appealed a ruling by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, which had overturned the conviction on due process grounds.The U.S. Supreme Court has rejected the bid by prosecutors in Pennsylvania to reinstate Bill Cosby’s conviction for sexual assault, a decision that ends the criminal case that had led to imprisonment for the man once known as America’s Dad.In an order issued Monday, the court said, without elaborating, that it had declined to hear the appeal filed by prosecutors last November.The Supreme Court’s decision leaves in place a ruling issued by an appellate court in Pennsylvania last year that had overturned Mr. Cosby’s 2018 conviction on due process grounds, allowing Mr. Cosby, 84, to walk free after serving nearly three years of a three-to-10-year prison sentence.Mr. Cosby had been found guilty of drugging and sexually assaulting Andrea Constand at his home outside Philadelphia, though his lawyers argued at trial that the encounter, in 2004, had been consensual.The case, one of the first high-profile criminal prosecutions of the #MeToo era, drew widespread attention, in part because of Mr. Cosby’s celebrity and in part because dozens of women had over a period of years leveled similar accusations of sexual abuse against the entertainer. But the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled last June that Mr. Cosby’s due process rights had been violated when the Montgomery County District Attorney’s office pursued a criminal case against him despite what the appellate court found was a binding verbal promise not to prosecute given to him by a previous district attorney.The former district attorney, Bruce L. Castor Jr., who said he believed Ms. Constand but was not sure he could win a conviction, said he had agreed years ago not to press charges against Mr. Cosby to induce him to testify in a civil case brought by Ms. Constand. He said the substance of his promise was contained in a news release he issued at the time that said he found insufficient credible and admissible evidence. But he held out the possibility of a civil action “with a much lower standard of proof.” Ms. Constand later received $3.38 million as part of a settlement in her civil case against Mr. Cosby.During the civil case, Mr. Cosby acknowledged giving narcotics to women as part of an effort to have sex with them, a statement that was later introduced as evidence at Mr. Cosby’s trial.Understand Bill Cosby’s Sexual Assault CaseBill Cosby was released from prison June 30, 2021, after the Pennsylvania Supreme Court overturned his 2018 conviction for sexual assault.Why He Was Released: Here’s a breakdown of the issues surrounding the ruling to overturn the conviction.What Legal Analysts Think: The court’s decision opened an unusually vigorous debate among the legal community.His Uncertain Future: Experts say it’s unlikely the ruling will change the public perception of the former star.The Aftermath: The Times critic Wesley Morris looks at what to do with our fondness for “The Cosby Show,” and W. Kamau Bell’s documentary series contextualizes his legacy.Following Mr. Cosby’s conviction in 2018, an intermediate appeals court in Pennsylvania found that no formal agreement never to prosecute had ever existed, a position that aligned with what the trial court had ruled.But in a 6-to-1 ruling, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court found that Mr. Cosby had, in fact, relied on Mr. Castor’s assurances that he wouldn’t be prosecuted, and that charging Mr. Cosby and using his testimony concerning drugs at the criminal trial had violated his due process rights.Prosecutors had argued that such a promise had never been made. They said that no one else in the district attorney’s office at the time had been made aware of it and that a news release could not be the basis of a formal immunity agreement.A spokesman for Mr. Cosby, Andrew Wyatt, welcomed the decision Monday, saying in a statement that the entertainer and his family “would like to offer our sincere gratitude to the justices of the United States Supreme Court for following the rules of law and protecting the Constitutional Rights of ALL American Citizens.”Ms. Constand and her lawyers released a statement Monday that criticized the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s ruling, in particular faulting the panel for assuming “there was a valid agreement not to prosecute, which was vigorously disputed in the Habeas proceedings, and determined by the trial judge not to exist.”Andrea Constand and her lawyers have consistently taken issue with the reasoning of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in overturning Mr. Cosby’s conviction.Angela Lewis for The New York TimesThe Montgomery County district attorney, Kevin R. Steele, released a statement in which he expressed his appreciation to Ms. Constand and described petitioning for Supreme Court review as “the right thing to do,” even though there was only a small chance the court would take up the case.“All crime victims deserve to be heard, treated with respect and be supported through their day in court,” the statement continued. “I wish her the best as she moves forward in her life.”Mr. Cosby was first accused in 2005 of having molested Ms. Constand, then an employee of the Temple University basketball team for whom he had become a mentor. The case was reopened in 2015, and Mr. Cosby went through two trials, the first of which ended with a hung jury. The second ended in April 2018, with a jury in Montgomery County convicting Mr. Cosby of three counts of aggravated indecent assault.Both cases were closely watched by many of the women who came forward with similar accusations but statutes of limitations in their cases made further prosecutions unlikely.Mr. Cosby has consistently denied the accusations that he was a sexual predator, suggesting that any encounters were completely consensual.Patricia Leary Steuer, who accused Mr. Cosby of drugging and assaulting her in 1978 and 1980, said in an interview on Monday that she felt “a little let down by the decision” but that “it does not change anything for me and the other survivors” since, she said, public sentiment is on their side.“The survivors did what we were supposed to do which was to come forward and tell the truth and that’s what we did,” she said. “The rest is out of our hands.”Legal experts had predicted it would be unlikely that the Supreme Court, which denies the vast majority of petitions for review, would take up the Cosby case. For one thing, they said, the case involved a unique set of circumstances that did not necessarily raise far-reaching constitutional issues.Dennis McAndrews, a Pennsylvania lawyer and former prosecutor who has followed the case, said the Supreme Court typically “looks to determine whether there are compelling issues of constitutional law about which the courts across the country need additional guidance, especially if the case is capable of repetition.”Shan Wu, a former federal prosecutor in Washington, said the Supreme Court likely considered whether its ruling would have the potential for broader significance outside the parameters of this case. “It’s a very unique set of circumstances,” he said. “It’s highly unlikely to be repeated.” More

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      in Television

      Jerry Harris of ‘Cheer’ Pleads Guilty to Sex Crimes Involving Minors

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      Mr. Harris, of the Netflix show “Cheer,” reached an agreement with prosecutors requiring that he plead guilty to two of seven federal charges.Jerry Harris, who shot to reality-TV fame in the Netflix show “Cheer,” pleaded guilty on Thursday to federal charges related to soliciting child sexual abuse imagery and illegal sexual conduct with a minor, reversing his earlier plea.Over a year ago, Mr. Harris, 22, pleaded not guilty to the seven felony charges brought against him in Chicago. But in a remote hearing on Thursday, he told Judge Manish S. Shah that he reached a plea agreement with prosecutors and was pleading guilty to two of those counts, which involved charges that he persuaded a 17-year-old to send him sexually explicit photos for money and traveled to Florida “for the purpose of engaging in illicit sexual conduct” with a 15-year-old.The plea agreement stipulates that after sentencing on the two counts, prosecutors would ask for the remaining charges to be dropped, Judge Shah said at the hearing.Mr. Harris’s lawyers released a statement saying that Mr. Harris wanted to “take responsibility for his actions and publicly convey his remorse for the harm he has caused the victims.”Mr. Harris, whose enthusiastic encouragement of his teammates made him into a viral star after the debut of “Cheer,” had himself been sexually abused as a child in the world of competitive cheerleading, the statement said.“There being no safe harbor to discuss his exploitation, Jerry instead masked his trauma and put on the bright face and infectious smile that the world came to know,” the statement said. “As we now know, Jerry became an offender himself as an older teenager.”Kelly Guzman, a prosecutor in the case, said at the hearing that one of the counts to which Mr. Harris entered a guilty plea was for receiving and attempting to receive child pornography. In the summer of 2020, she said, Mr. Harris repeatedly requested that a 17-year-old send him sexually explicit photos and videos, in exchange for a total of about $3,000.The other count involved Mr. Harris traveling from Texas to Florida with the intent of engaging in illegal sexual conduct with a 15-year-old, Ms. Guzman said. Mr. Harris directed the teenager to meet him in a public bathroom in Orlando, Fla., where he sexually assaulted him, the prosecutor said.Mr. Harris said he understood the nature of the charges and possible prison time before entering his guilty plea.Mr. Harris was arrested and charged with production of child pornography in September 2020, months after the release of “Cheer,” which follows a national champion cheerleading team from a small-town Texas community college.Around the same time, he was sued by teenage twin brothers who said he sent sexually explicit messages to them, requested nude photos and solicited sex from them. (Mr. Harris befriended the boys when they were 13 and he was 19, USA Today reported.)In a voluntary interview with the authorities in 2020, Mr. Harris acknowledged that he had exchanged sexually explicit photos on Snapchat with at least 10 to 15 people he knew were minors and had sex with a 15-year-old at a cheerleading competition in 2019, according to a criminal complaint.After federal agents interviewed other minors who said they had had relationships with Mr. Harris, they filed additional felony charges against him. The charges that Mr. Harris did not plead guilty to on Thursday include four counts of sexual exploitation of children and one count of enticement. The seven charges involve five minor boys.Mr. Harris has been held at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Chicago since his arrest.One episode of the second season of “Cheer,” which was released last month, centers on the case against Mr. Harris and includes interviews with the teenage plaintiffs, Mr. Harris’s former cheerleading teammates and the team’s coach, Monica Aldama, about the charges.Mr. Harris will be sentenced on June 28. The plea agreement noted that sentencing guidelines “may recommend 50 years in prison” for the offenses, Judge Shah said, adding that he may decide differently.The statement from Mr. Harris’s lawyers said he has been participating in therapy in prison and “will spend the rest of his life making amends for what he has done.”Robert Chiarito More

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      in Movies

      Kamau Bell: Bill Cosby Is Key to Understanding America

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      When W. Kamau Bell was growing up, Bill Cosby was the “wallpaper of Black America” and an inspiration, Bell said in a recent interview. Bell’s new documentary, “We Need to Talk About Cosby,” surveys the star’s long career and cultural impact, as well as the accusations of sexual assault that culminated in his conviction, on three counts of aggravated indecent assault, in 2018. Cosby was freed from prison in June 2021 after an appeals court ruled that his due process rights had been violated.The four-part documentary — which premieres on Showtime on Sunday — consists of clips from his shows and standup act, conversations with women who accused Cosby and a parade of other interviewees who try to process the Cosby story and his legacy.As a comedian and host of shows like CNN’s “United Shades of America,” Bell said he has become known as a guy who is willing to have difficult conversations. But the one about Cosby was tougher than most, generating criticism from both sides: Some Cosby accusers didn’t talk to him because they didn’t want to be part of a project that includes Cosby’s achievements. At the same time, Bell said, he has been accused of tearing down a Black role model when he could be examining white transgressors instead.Last week, Cosby criticized the project through his spokesman, Andrew Wyatt, who added that Cosby continues to deny all allegations against him. Wyatt also praised Cosby’s work in the entertainment industry. “Mr. Cosby has spent more than 50 years standing with the excluded,” he said in a statement.As a reporter who covered Bill Cosby’s trials for The New York Times, I am familiar with the accusations against him. But the documentary sets those accusations in a deep context of American culture and Cosby’s career.Recently I spoke to Bell by video call about making the series, and about his belief that Cosby’s story is a story about America. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.Hi Kamau. How are you doing?[Laughs.] You’ve covered this story a lot, so I think you probably have some sense of how I’m doing. And then add Black into it.You’ve described to me the trepidation you felt about getting involved in something that had the potential to be “toxic.” What do you mean by that?We reached out to people, and we got so many “no”s so quickly. At the time, he was still in prison, and I thought, Oh maybe we can finally have the productive Bill Cosby conversation. But with every note I got from people who were really doing well in show business, what I’m hearing is, “This is a bad idea.” Not that they would say that outright, but the feeling was, No, I don’t want to touch that. Maybe they didn’t want to touch it with me, but I think generally they don’t want to touch it.Why would they say that?I mean specifically for Black people, whether you were involved indirectly or not, it’s hard to have a productive conversation about Bill Cosby without frustrating some of your audience who still wants to support him, whether they believe he did these things or not..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-3btd0c{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-3btd0c{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-3btd0c strong{font-weight:600;}.css-3btd0c em{font-style:italic;}.css-1kpebx{margin:0 auto;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-1kpebx{font-family:nyt-cheltenham,georgia,’times new roman’,times,serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.375rem;line-height:1.625rem;}@media (min-width:740px){#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-1kpebx{font-size:1.6875rem;line-height:1.875rem;}}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1kpebx{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-1gtxqqv{margin-bottom:0;}.css-1g3vlj0{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1g3vlj0{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-1g3vlj0 strong{font-weight:600;}.css-1g3vlj0 em{font-style:italic;}.css-1g3vlj0{margin-bottom:0;margin-top:0.25rem;}.css-19zsuqr{display:block;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}.css-12vbvwq{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-12vbvwq{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-12vbvwq:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-12vbvwq{border:none;padding:10px 0 0;border-top:2px solid #121212;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-qjk116{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-qjk116 strong{font-weight:700;}.css-qjk116 em{font-style:italic;}.css-qjk116 a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-underline-offset:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:visited{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}How did the idea for the documentary come about?The idea came very naturally in a conversation with [Boardwalk Pictures Production]. I liked their work, they liked my work, and we started talking about comedian documentaries. Generally, there are not enough great comedian documentaries, and then through that conversation it was, “Could you do one about a comedian who has fallen?” There are any number to hold up, but Bill Cosby was the one we talked about. And I’ve been thinking about this Bill Cosby conversation for years.What did you hope to achieve?When I started making it, as we say in the doc, he was in prison. It sort of felt like the Bill Cosby story was, in large part, over. So maybe now we can have the conversation, and it’s a conversation I was already having in my head and with other people. Seeing people online trying to have it, the conversation wasn’t happening in a productive way.We have to learn something from this. If we don’t have the conversation, I don’t think we’re going to learn. The guy that I believed he was when I was growing up and when I was a young adult — that guy would want me to learn something from this.So on some level, your example, Bill Cosby, led me to try to figure this out.So what did you figure out?[Kierna Mayo, the former editor in chief of Ebony magazine] said something to the effect of, “Bill Cosby is key to understanding America.” To me, that’s what this is about.There are two runaway forces of oppression in America: One, how we treat nonwhite people. The other is how we have treated women through the history of this country. And if you look at Bill Cosby’s career, you can see things he did that makes this better and makes this worse. I believe there’s a lot to learn there.Kierna Mayo, the former editor in chief of Ebony, is among the interviewees who try to process the Cosby legacy in “We Need to Talk About Cosby.”ShowtimeYou use a timeline device in a powerful way that allows you to talk about the highlights of his career and also locate the timing of the accusations against him.I don’t like when documentaries tell some personal story but they don’t connect to history. Because you want to know what was happening when that happened — that helps give us the sense of why this is even more interesting.It doesn’t make sense to talk about Bill Cosby as if he was a solo man in the world. You have to really see how the boys-will-be-boys culture of Hollywood, specifically in the ’60s, invites a kind of behavior that allows predators to hide.It also lays this timeline of his career, the timeline of America and the timeline of the accusations on top of each other, which helps you see them in a new way.You raise the question about who else knew at the time about the accusations against Cosby, but you don’t come up with many specific answers. Did you try to talk to senior figures in the industry?Yeah. but we didn’t have access to any of those people. And I’m not an investigative journalist, so there’s a point at which I have to accept that I’m here to take all that we know and start to figure out what were the circumstances through which this went down.Ultimately, the bigger thing is it’s clear that the industry overall is not doing a good job, and the people who run the industry are probably still not doing the best job they can do. That’s the bigger issue to me.At times, it seems that the “We” in “We need to talk about Cosby” refers mainly to a Black audience. Are there some complexities of the Cosby case that are particular to Black people?I would say the “We” is those of us who feel connected to Bill Cosby. Now it just so happens that a lot of those people are Black people. But let’s be clear: He was America’s dad, not Black America’s dad. He was universal. Everybody who worked on this, no matter what their race was, if they were of a certain generation, they were like, “Yeah, I watched that show and felt like I was part of that family, too.”Even this interview is complicated: For a lot of people, I will be tearing down a Black man in a white newspaper in front of a white man. And the question is, why isn’t this interview about Harvey Weinstein, or Trump, or other people who have had allegations of sexual assault? Those are the questions that are coming at me now on social media — like, why this man?What do you say to your detractors?I learned long ago you can’t win those battles on social media, so I’m sort of allowing them to happen. I’m going to handle it by talking to you and other outlets, and by making sure I talk to Black press outlets, places where maybe those people will go. But I don’t think there’s any resolving it. If those people watch it, they will learn it is a more nuanced conversation than I think they believe it is.This is another trite thing to say, but we have to be on the right side of history here. Can this be an opportunity for a large percentage of this country to actually work to make the system and structures better, from the highest levels of show business and corporate America, through working-class America, all the way down to how sex education is taught in schools? There are so many levels of this — those of us who want to be on the right side of history have to do the work to rebuild these systems. You ask many times in the documentary, “Who is Bill Cosby now?” Did you come to a conclusion yourself?Somebody who has always taught us about America and is still teaching us about America, even if it’s in ways he does not want to. And it is very important for us to learn all of the lessons of Bill Cosby if we’re actually going to be a better society.Also embedded in that, and it’s hard to say it, but in the greater context: [Cosby is] one of the key figures for Black America and America in the 20th century. And one of the greatest standup comedians of all time. And the creator of one of the best sitcoms of all time. And, throughout a lot of his career, an advocate for Black excellence. But if you want to engage with that, you have to engage with the other stuff.Cosby was released from prison before you finished the documentary. How did his release change things?I didn’t want this, but it gave it a more immediate feel — this is an active situation again. He’s out in the world again, which means all the defenders are out there in the world again and feel emboldened. So it feels both more important to tell this story and scary to tell this story, because people are invested in protecting him.The most valuable conversation to me isn’t the film — it’s the conversation that we all have after we watch the film. No matter what you think about Bill Cosby’s story, it is critical that we create a society that treats survivors of sexual assault better. More

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      in Movies

      Woody Allen’s ‘Rifkin’s Festival’ Is Opening in U.S. Theaters

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      Following renewed scrutiny in recent years over the sexual abuse allegations against Woody Allen brought by his adopted daughter, it was unclear whether Allen’s latest film, “Rifkin’s Festival,” would get a U.S. theatrical release.Actors and producers in the United States have increasingly declined to work with Allen, but he has continued to find support in Europe. “Rifkin’s Festival” received backing from Spanish and Italian production companies and premiered at the San Sebastián Film Festival in Spain in 2020.Starting on Friday, “Rifkin’s Festival” will get a limited run in some theaters in the United States — the list is currently 25 theaters long, according to the movie’s website. The only theater in New York City that is signed up to show the film is Quad Cinema, in Greenwich Village.It is also available to stream on several platforms, including Amazon Prime Video, iTunes and Google Play.The sexual abuse allegations against Allen, 86, received a new wave of attention last year after HBO released its docuseries “Allen v. Farrow,” which examined Dylan Farrow’s accusation that he sexually assaulted her at the family’s Connecticut country house in 1992. Dylan and her mother, Mia Farrow, participated in the project, walking the filmmakers through the events of that time, including the prosecutor’s decision not to press charges against Allen to spare Dylan the trauma of a trial.Allen, who has long denied the allegations, called the series a “shoddy hit piece” that “had no interest in the truth.”“Rifkin’s Festival” is about an ex-film professor and struggling novelist who accompanies his publicist wife to a film festival in Spain (the same one that premiered the movie). The husband (played by Wallace Shawn) only goes to keep an eye on his wife (Gina Gershon) and her flirtations with a hotshot director.The critic Jessica Kiang reviewed the film for The New York Times after its premiere, and compared it favorably to Allen’s 2019 film “A Rainy Day in New York,” which was dropped by Amazon as scrutiny increased over Dylan Farrow’s allegations and ended up having a limited theatrical run in the United States. (Allen sued Amazon for terminating his four-picture deal; the company settled.)“‘Rifkin’s Festival’ is far less objectionable,” Kiang wrote, “and though that is praise so faint it needs smelling salts, with latter-day Woody Allen, we must be thankful for small mercies.”In recent years, some actors have said that they would not work with Allen because of Dylan Farrow’s allegations, but others have come to the director’s defense.In November, Shawn defended his decision to take the role, writing in an essay in The Wrap that he has been “troubled by the speed with which some of my colleagues in the acting fraternity have distanced themselves from Woody.”In a recent interview with WGN television station in Chicago, Gershon said she chose to work with Allen because he is a “genius.”“It serves no one to keep great artists from working, even the alleged victims, right?” she said.A representative for Dylan Farrow did not comment.Letty Aronson, Allen’s sister and a producer on the film, did not respond to requests for comment. More

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      Lawsuit Says Faculty at a Top Arts School Preyed on Students for Decades

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      Dozens of people who studied at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts during a period of more than 40 years say they were sexually, emotionally or physically abused there as minors.The breadth of the 236-page complaint is as stunning as its details are disturbing.A total of 56 former arts students say dozens of teachers and administrators participated in, or allowed, their sexual, physical and emotional abuse when they were in school. Overall, the misconduct spanned more than 40 years, beginning in the late 1960s, according to the lawsuit, and included assaults in classrooms, private homes off campus, a motel room off a highway, and a tour bus rumbling through Italy.Respected figures in the dance and performing arts world who worked at the school are said to have participated.The lawsuit, filed late last year, accuses faculty at the prestigious University of North Carolina School of the Arts of a range of abuses including rape. Court papers describe student complaints of being groped, of being fondled through their leotards and of alcohol-fueled dance parties where students as young as 14 were told to completely disrobe and perform ballet moves.“We were children, and we were brave enough to come forward and not one single adult that represented the institution was as brave as we were,” said Melissa Cummings, 42, who described in an interview and court documents being invited to such parties as a student in 1995. She said she reported the abuse to the police and school officials when she was a senior there in 1997, but little changed.“Your teenage years are so formative,” she said. “It destroyed me.”Former students at the arts school, Chris Alloways-Ramsey, left, Melissa Cummings and Frank Holliday, are three of the 56 plaintiffs in the lawsuit.Janet Linup; Chris Cummings; Rafael SalgadoSome of the teachers characterized in the lawsuit as the worst offenders are now dead. Others have yet to respond in court papers; still others declined or did not respond to requests for comment.But the school itself, which is the lead defendant in the case, has expressed concern about the seriousness of the allegations and sought to assure the public that it has changed.“I was personally horrified when I was made aware of the allegations in the complaint,” Brian Cole, the chancellor of the School of the Arts, said in a statement. “I respect the tremendous courage it took for our alumni to come forward and share their experiences, and we are committed to responding with empathy and openness in listening to their stories.” He also noted that “U.N.C.S.A. today has systems in place for students to report abuse of any kind.”The school was the nation’s first public arts conservatory when it opened in the 1960s as the North Carolina School of the Arts in a quiet neighborhood just outside downtown Winston-Salem. According to court papers, the residential high school and college recruited students as young as 12, to study ballet, modern dance, music and other disciplines on a campus that included summer programs. It became part of the University of North Carolina system in 1972.Some former students, teachers and school administrators have said throughout the years that their experience at the institution had been formative and enriching. But the plaintiffs depict a setting of rampant misconduct, and their lawsuit, filed in Forsyth County Superior Court, says it occurred, not for one year or two, but for decades, at one of the country’s most renowned arts schools.The lawsuit seeks damages from 29 individuals named as defendants, eight of whom are accused in court papers of having directly abused students. In addition, the court documents say, 19 former administrators are said to have done nothing to stop a culture of exploitation so widespread that some students invented nicknames for two dance instructors described as the most prolific abusers — Richard Kuch and Richard Gain. They were known as “Crotch” and “Groin,” according to the court papers, which say the teachers often invited their minor students to a rural home, known as “The Farm,” where students said they were abused.Mr. Kuch and Mr. Gain resigned from the arts school in 1995 after the school’s chancellor initiated termination proceedings against them. Mr. Kuch died in 2020, according to public records. Attempts to reach Mr. Gain were unsuccessful.The suit was filed under the terms of a look-back law adopted in North Carolina in 2019 that opened a window for adult victims of child sexual abuse to sue individuals and institutions they hold responsible, even if the statute of limitations on their claims had expired. (The law is currently facing legal challenges.)Similar laws are in place in roughly two dozen states, including California and New York following high-profile cases of sex abuse by authority figures that led lawmakers to rethink the wisdom of legally imposing time limits on the reporting of sex crimes.“Our lawsuit against U.N.C.S.A. is an important example of a national trend,” said Gloria Allred, who is among the lawyers representing the victims in the case. “We are very proud of our clients for speaking truth to power and finding their courage to hold accountable those whom they believe have betrayed them.”Some of the allegations had emerged publicly in a 1995 lawsuit brought by Christopher Soderlund, who is also a plaintiff in the current case. Mr. Soderlund’s lawsuit was eventually dismissed on the grounds that the three-year statute of limitations on his claims had expired.At that time, the U.N.C. Board of Governors formed an independent commission “to review and respond to the concerns vocalized,” and produced a report that found “no widespread sexual misconduct at U.N.C.S.A.,” Chancellor Cole wrote in a letter to the campus community last fall.In the current case, former students say that they endured the abuse in part because their tormentors sat on the juries that had the power to decide who to readmit each year. The court papers say the students were groomed to accept the abuse by teachers who suggested they were worthless, that their chosen professions in the arts would be cruel and that only by doing whatever their elite instructors demanded would they be able to succeed in their careers.“It’s a very hard thing to explain,” said Christopher Alloways-Ramsey, one of the plaintiffs who has accused a ballet teacher, Duncan Noble, and others, of abusing him. (Mr. Noble’s work as an arts instructor was praised in his obituary in The New York Times in 2002.)“You’re 16 years old and you really desperately want a career in ballet. The person you idolize is telling you, ‘I can give you that.’ The underlying subtext is that there will be something in exchange,” Mr. Alloways-Ramsey, 53, added. “But as a young person, you don’t actually understand what that might be.”The court documents say that in the 1980s teachers held mandatory “bikini” days in modern dance class. In later years, teenage drama students were told to “seduce” their professors and were instructed to kiss each other lustfully for extended periods of time. Former students said instructors including Mr. Kuch, Mr. Gain and Melissa Hayden, the now deceased former star of New York City Ballet, often told them they needed to have sex in order to benefit their performance as dancers. Ms. Hayden was described in court papers as a verbally and physically abusive instructor, who, for example, beat a student on the leg with a stick and slapped another on the back so hard it knocked the student off her feet.Some of the most egregious abuse occurred in private settings, according to the complaint, which said a ballet instructor once sat on a toilet in his hotel room and watched a student as she bathed. In another instance reported in the suit, a trombone teacher is said to have led a 16-year-old student into a dark room during an off-campus party, unzipped his pants and assaulted her.The school had been the subject of a similar lawsuit in 1995 but the case was dismissed on statute of limitations grounds. The former student who was the plaintiff in that case has joined the new lawsuit. Julia Wall/The News & Observer“It was soul crushing” said Frank Holliday, 64, of Brooklyn, who described the trauma of having to crawl through a dorm-room window after having sex with Mr. Kuch to avoid notice and embarrassment.One former instructor accused in the suit, Stephen Shipps, who taught violin and left in 1989 for the University of Michigan, pleaded guilty in 2021 in federal court to one count of transporting a minor across state lines to engage in sexual activity. Mr. Shipps retired from the University of Michigan in February 2019, according to multiple news reports. His sentencing is set for Feb. 17.In the current lawsuit, Mr. Shipps is accused of having summoned a 17-year-old student to his school office where he engaged in inappropriate sexual relations with her every day of the workweek.Reached by telephone, Mr. Shipps declined to comment.The suit also accuses the so-called defendant administrators of failing to protect the students, asserting they “clearly knew or should have known of the sexual exploitation and abuse of minor and other students that was occurring” and that they “unconscionably allowed this egregious and outrageous conduct to continue.”Ethan Stiefel, a former American Ballet Theater star who later became a dean at the arts school, is one administrator listed as having held a position of responsibility at the time of some of the alleged abuse.Attempts to reach Mr. Stiefel by telephone and email were unsuccessful.When Mr. Soderlund’s lawsuit was filed years ago, and in recent months as the new court case drew attention, some former faculty members and school administrators have said they had no knowledge of the sort of misconduct described in the case.In a telephone interview, Joan Sanders-Seidel, 88, a former faculty member who taught ballet and worked in the dance department for more than 20 years, described the students as among the most talented and industrious in the country, and a joy to teach.“It was very special,” she said of the school, adding that she “loved every minute” of working there.Ms. Sanders-Seidel’s own daughter attended the school and they only recently discussed the allegations of abuse, she said.“I’m surprised about how stupid I was — how unaware,” Ms. Sanders-Seidel said. “I was never a naïve, innocent little dancer myself. So if I suspected anything, I probably just brushed it off.”Kirsten Noyes contributed research. More

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      in Television

      Chris Noth Peloton Ad Pulled After Sexual Assault Allegations

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      The online ad, a response to the “Sex and the City” reboot, was removed after The Hollywood Reporter published an article in which two women accused the actor of sexual assault.Peloton pulled down a popular online ad featuring the actor Chris Noth on Thursday after The Hollywood Reporter published an article in which two women accused him of sexual assault.The article detailed the accusations of two women, identified with pseudonyms, who claimed Noth — who played Mr. Big on “Sex and the City” and stars in its new reboot — sexually assaulted them in separate incidents in 2004 and 2015. In a statement, Noth called their accusations “categorically false.”After the allegations surfaced, Peloton, the stationary-bike maker, removed a widely viewed online ad featuring Noth. It had quickly put up the ad after the first episode of the “Sex and the City” reboot — the HBO Max limited series, “And Just Like That” — depicted Mr. Big dying of a heart attack after riding a Peloton bike.“Every single sexual assault accusation must be taken seriously,” Peloton said in a statement. “We were unaware of these allegations when we featured Chris Noth in our response to HBO’s reboot.”One woman told The Hollywood Reporter that Noth, 67, raped her in 2004, when she was 22, after inviting her to his apartment building’s pool in West Hollywood; the woman said that after the assault, a friend took her to the hospital, where she received stitches. Another woman said he assaulted her in 2015, when she was 25, after a date in New York City.“The encounters were consensual,” he said in the statement. “It’s difficult not to question the timing of these stories coming out. I don’t know for certain why they are surfacing now, but I do know this: I did not assault these women.”Noth, who also had roles in “Law & Order” and “The Good Wife,” is best known for his role as Mr. Big, the central love interest and eventual husband of Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) in “Sex and the City.” His death in the reboot shocked fans and set social media ablaze. Peloton’s stock dropped the day after the episode became available.Three days after the episode debuted, Peloton tried to make the most of the ill-fated product placement by releasing the parody ad, which features Noth lounging with his Peloton instructor, extolling the health benefits of the exercise machine while he flirted with her. In the clip, Mr. Noth suggestively raises an eyebrow, seemingly glancing back toward the bedroom, and asks, “Shall we take another ride? Life’s too short not to.”Then, after the sexual assault allegations surfaced, Peloton’s post on Twitter that included the video disappeared. In a statement, the company said it had archived social media posts related to the video and stopped promoting it while it sought to “learn more” about the allegations.HBO declined to comment. More