'Law & Order: SVU' vs. Occupy Wall Street: Warren Leight Tweets, Deletes

Following the bizarre scene in Manhattan's Foley Square Thursday night, which saw Occupy Wall Street protestors take over and occupy a TV set recreation of their Zuccotti Park camp, "Law & Order: SVU" show runner Warren Leight issued a short statement about the situation in the form of three Twitter updates -- all of which he then deleted.

"Saddened by last night's events. We understand OWS emotions run high, and also protestors' fear of having their images and history," he wrote. "Co-opted by corporate media -- the irony here is the scene we couldn't shoot portrayed OWS in a sympathetic light," he then wrote (with a dead link here). "Harassing night shift Production Assistants. Those are not the images of OWS we wanted our audience to see. Let's move forward," he continued. All of his tweets can be seen in a screen-grab of his page below.

When reached for comment, NBC said they would "not be commenting on the story at this time."

The set -- made to look like the encampment that became emblematic of the worldwide Occupy movement and that was cleared out by the New York Police Deptartment in November -- had mock signs, tents, a library and a kitchen. The real protestors who swarmed the scene suspected that "SVU" intended to portray them in something other than a flattering light.

"Basically, obviously, 'Law & Order' was using this as a backdrop for some salacious story," Han Shan, a member of the OWS press team, told The Huffington Post. "There are certainly some folks who feel really offended by the attempt to kind of use this very real, very living movement, this economic justice movement that's making real change for working families in this country, to use it in some kind of story line in this dramatic cop show."

PHOTOS (via Sandi Bachom):

 

 

Comments

[OAK STREET MAFIA]

12:48 PM on 12/14/2011

I love OWS! I too mess with movie and television sets. Nobody messes with the "Mafia"
.

[swlewis57]

09:45 AM on 12/11/2011

If anybody goes into the TV station or, worse yet, my control room to disrupt operations there will be an immediate negative reaction from me. Just sayin.'

[theaustralian]

11:54 AM on 12/10/2011

I think Law and order :svu could find a better setting at a tea party rally. i mean theres special victims all around there.

[werewolf123]

10:27 AM on 12/10/2011

This article explains the right in California to control the use of your image and likeness. The author looks at what celebrities need to be prove in a privacy or publicity rights case and how civil publicity rights and privacy rights cases differ from criminal actions for identity theft.

http://www.hg.org/article.asp?id=5609

[MissIndependentLady]

10:20 AM on 12/10/2011

I have sided with OWS since day one, but I can't find it in myself to support them on this. You started this huge movement and you didn't expect for it to be portrayed in TV shows? And why can't they? You would think a movement that has mostly liberal people in it would be okay with artistic freedom. Besides, they're not going to be portrayed negatively in L&O.

By the way, where was their outrage when South Park created an entire episode parodying their movement? lol

[Tony McSway]

09:14 AM on 12/10/2011

This reminds me of a song:

"I see your true colors, shining through
I see your truuuueeee colors, shining through!"

OWS = thugs that use violence to et their ways. This will end tragically for them, as most of them are skinny hipsters that scatter like roaches when pressure is applied.

[kostamagas]

11:15 AM on 12/11/2011

I disagree. I think they are too peaceful and let everybody push them around.

[Lucas Mathers]

12:34 AM on 12/12/2011

There you are... trolling again. Waste of time, know nothing and like to call people names.

[breakingpoint]

09:09 AM on 12/10/2011

someone wants to put a clown suit on you - are you just going to let them?

get some dignity - life is not a TV SHOW

[Tony McSway]

09:15 AM on 12/10/2011

Dignity? LOL

Sleeping outside and defactating on the sidewalk, and you think they have dignity? LOL

[breakingpoint]

05:28 PM on 12/10/2011

that's why you force vets to do

[lurker101]

12:22 PM on 12/11/2011

how exactly do you "defactate"

[Parade Keegan]

05:46 AM on 12/10/2011

I'm pro OWS but these people have gone "around the bend" if they think there can't be dramatizations about it, it's not 9/11!

[Lucas Mathers]

12:36 AM on 12/12/2011

It's an important movement that has already been misrepresented in the mainstream media. If you're actually "pro OWS" you should understand that.

[CubfanBudman]

01:19 AM on 12/10/2011

I'm left of center.

I think OWS jumped the shark and it is time for them to go home.

They had our attention and support for about a month. But they had no message, not demands, and no spokesperson. They allowed themselves to be defined by the media. And of course, all the media had to report on was the crimes committed and the human waste left by protesters.

They had their shot but never stepped up to the plate to take their swings.

I spent Thanksgiving in Portland, OR with people who gave thanks that they could live in their "Liberal Bubble". They talked about OWS as if it was a freak show that they wanted nothing to do with.

I'll admit that they did have an effect on the political discussion and who should be paying more. But their time has come and gone.

[madgrrl]

02:01 AM on 12/12/2011

Oh no, I think this movement is just the beginning and I will tell you why. This movement is being defined by a young new generation of students just like the old students of the sixties. The students of the sixties rallying cry was the Vietnam war. These students realize their future has been obliterated by corporate greed at a time when they are saddled with huge amounts of student debt. Their parents have been screwed over by corporate America as well. I spoke to one the other day (student not OWS) with over $40,000 in debt from a state school, working two jobs - NO jobs on the horizon. Go talk to some young students who just graduated and are NOT from rich well connected families and you will see...

[rlrose328]

04:22 PM on 12/12/2011

Well... the previous generation caused this entitlement that people have by lying to their children and telling them that a college education is all you need. Then the government and Wall Street lied to all of us by telling us what we NEEDED to have and giving us money to get it, KNOWING we wouldn't be able to pay.

But this long-term sit-in is not going to solve it. It provides no solutions, only more problems.

[rlrose328]

04:20 PM on 12/12/2011

THIS. You've said it perfectly. I'm a very left of center, organic, long-haired tree-hugger and I just cannot embrace this movement any more. They have accomplished nothing, regardless how much their supporters continue to insist they have. The sit-ins of the sixties accomplished nothing, either, but gaining the ire of the rest of the country they purported to represent. The OWSers and I may share many sentiments and beliefs, but that's where it ends. We need to actually DO something now.

[PatrickforO]

01:06 AM on 12/10/2011

I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, Shan's 'salacious story' comment has merit. Clearly the network and the show's producers are seeking publicity which may increase the show's ratings.

But...

On the other hand, there are many low information people out there who wait with drool hanging off their chins for the next GOP-speak from the mother ship. Having the OWS movement portrayed on a police drama might reach a few people with a message, depending on how the film is edited. I know this rationalization might be lame, and I would not make it, save an hour long conversation I had with the manager of a telemarketing company after I received the umphteenth call from that company and had repeatedly asked to be removed from the call list. Just a regular guy, but got ALL his 'news' from FOX. Asked me what I thought of Sarah Palin. Seriously. Spent some serious time talking to him about the real issues that confront us and the present effort by the 1% toward the final corporate takeover of the United States. I may have opened his eyes...bet he's an SVU watcher!

[Lucas Mathers]

12:48 AM on 12/12/2011

Nice contribution... we do need to bridge the gap between the right and left and I'm glad you spent the time doing that. It's possible that SVU could have been a vehicle to reach that audience but it is disturbing that OWS should be used as a backdrop to a crime drama.

[just11]

12:55 AM on 12/10/2011

MSM is only propaganda of the criminal top 1% mixed with commercials.

OWS is the source of real information because it is about truth and justice.

[Tony McSway]

09:16 AM on 12/10/2011

lol

[Melody Breyer-Grell]

12:34 AM on 12/10/2011

Hmm. Doesn't most art (not that SVU is art, but just saying) follow life? People usually are not consulted...it is not a documentary. So although I share many of the views of OWS, if they did disrupt an artistic project, they are trying to use censorship as a way to get their message across. That is a form of paranoia, and leads to things like "Cultural Revolutions." Mob mentality, no matter right or left is deadly. Are there any "thinkers" out there on any "side?"

[garystartswithg]

01:05 AM on 12/10/2011

you contradict yourself so much you answer your own question and then pretend you didn't. perhaps by "thinker" you really mean passive agressive -- just like you. most people like to pretend they are thinkers, few are.

[PatrickforO]

01:16 AM on 12/10/2011

I don't know, Gary, she has a point. Her last sentence is clearly a bit over the top, but 'trying to use censorship as a way to get their message across' has a certain ring of truth in this case. Not to blame them - I am a supporter, and I know it's hard to always make the right decisions. I'm not sure this decision was so good, though it was made with the noble intent of keeping the message above the pedestrian venue of a cop drama.

[Melody Breyer-Grell]

05:50 AM on 12/10/2011

by thinker I mean someone like Thomas Jefferson and the like who can make policy, not just disrupt fictional program shooting. Your answer to me comes out of anger, but not reason...Rather than insult, why not discuss? I quess it is easy to speak behind a handle. It really breeds emotional abuse. And I was not thinking as much as pondering...Do you have anything concrete to offer, if so I would love to hear it...things are pretty dark

[PatrickforO]

01:11 AM on 12/10/2011

I really like your comment. They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and Carl Jung said in his essay on poetry and the collective unconscious that art is born at a place and a time where it needs to be seen, heard and felt. After all, most of the younger set have eschewed news channels all together and get most of their news from the Daily Show, Colbert and South Park. Why not SVU? A better bet for Shan might have been to work with the producers to ensure the movement is shown in a favorable light and some of the message actually gets out on the show. Lot's of misinformed people out there that might get their eyes opened just a bit.

[Candide33]

12:14 AM on 12/10/2011

The could have put that set anywhere, in any big city, they are rather generic in the down town areas.... they could have put it on the back lot...

[end0regime]

12:02 AM on 12/10/2011

If only they had protested in the right place against the right people, all OWS did was hurt the people who they day they were protesting for.

[jeffhintx]

11:44 PM on 12/09/2011

You know, maybe they could have CONSULTED with OWS members before just ripping it off.
Maybe the OWS people wouldn't have felt the way they did.
It takes a lot of nerve to set up a plot about a movement that has been taking pot shots by the media and not expect some defensiveness. NBC is owned by the ultra conservative Comcast Corporation, so it's not like there's no reason to be suspicious.

[Los Pepes]

11:53 PM on 12/09/2011

Yes NBC is well known for their right wing leanings just look at MSNBC

[Candide33]

11:59 PM on 12/09/2011

so true... they boot off any one who is even the least bit liberal ... they are almost as bad as Fox!

[jeffhintx]

01:40 AM on 12/10/2011

MSNBC has nothing to do with it.

This is program production, specifically a fictionalized crime drama series.
Second, there is a long standing habit of "fictionalized crime drama series" storylines that meddle with the actual substance known as reality.

That's fine. It is to be expected, because that's their job, hence they are *fictionalized*.

That said, it amazes me that people are upset when those who in the reality based community decide to take umbrage....almost like "how DARE they take issue with the lords of fiction?"

Yeah okayfine, sorry but...you know....I kinda think the REAL folks have every right to take issue with how they are going to be portrayed, especially when they are not even consulted.

[Tony McSway]

09:19 AM on 12/10/2011

Yes, they should have contacted the easily accessible OWS leadership committee. What?