From the WSJ:
"Given that it has been nearly two years and we have yet to see the first draft of a script, we have decided to no longer pursue this project with Icon," an ABC representative said late yesterday. The representative declined to comment further on why the project had been shelved.
ABC doesn't need to comment further — Frank Rich's dog could have told you that a Mel Gibson Holocaust project was a bad idea. Gibson's less-than-Jew-friendly leanings have been apparent since his Passion of the Christ plans came to light (not to mention his father's Holocaust revisionism, which Gibson defended).
With his DUI — which would have been your garden-variety celeb DUI but for the racist tirade of anti-Semitic bile, threats, and lunges at the arresting officer of whom Gibson asked "Are you a Jew?" — Gibson, it seems, has reached a tipping point. The New York Times notes the speed with which the scandal spread (hat tip: TMZ and "the Internet"). The NYT doesn't really elaborate much on what happened on this "Internet" but I do think that it's important to note the role of blogger response here, getting on the story and disseminating reaction in real-time (the zone-flooding Nikki Finke is the obvious example here).
Key also was HuffPo's own Ari Emanuel, whom the New York Times failed to mention but whose reponse may have itself been the tipping point here. Emanuel's immediate, unambiguous blog post condemning Gibson's rant and urging the industry to reject him and his racism was a pretty bold move, considering Gibson's bankability (not to mention the fact that he "owns Malibu," ha). Prior to Emanuel's post, no one from the industry had been willing to talk on the record. It doesn't take long for silence to morph into tacit approval, and who knows what might have become of ABC's planned project with Gibson had that been the case. Either way, once again this provides a compelling example of the power of online journalism and how it has completely upended the way breaking stories are told, shaped, and spread.
In other news, Gibson has apparently checked into rehab. To quote Ari Emanuel, we "wish Mel Gibson well in dealing with his alcoholism."
