Self-dealing GQ editor kills article at behest of widely-loathed CEO
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Even granting the probable Streisand effect, this is disgraceful behavior by GQ:
In an unusual step, GQ magazineremoved an article critical of powerful media executive David Zaslav from its website just hours after it was published Monday, following a complaint from Zaslav’s camp.
The story, by freelance film critic Jason Bailey, excoriated the CEO of Warner Bros. Discovery for his handling of the company’s entertainment properties — specifically perceived crimes against film, such as the layoffs at the Turner Classic Movies channel that outraged prominent directors and other superfans and his decision to not release finished movies such as “Batgirl”for tax purposes. At one point, Bailey compared Zaslav to tyrannical “Succession”patriarch Logan Roy.
“In a relatively short period of time, David Zaslav has become perhaps the most hated man in Hollywood,” Bailey wrote.
A Zaslav spokesman complained to GQ about the story soon after it was published, according to people close to the process who spoke on the condition of anonymity to preserve confidences. By early afternoon on Monday, the magazine had made extensive edits to the story.
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GQ has a corporate connection to Warner Bros. Discovery. The magazine’s parent company, Condé Nast, is owned by Advance Publications, a major shareholder in Warner Bros. Discovery. Advance Publications did not respond to a request for comment.
The edits and eventual deletion of the story angered top film critics. On Twitter, writer Scott Tobias said the edited version of the story was “completely unacceptable,” while critic Matt Zoller Seitz shared the archived version of Bailey’s article. Critic Hunter Harris illustrated the controversy on Twitter with a screenshot from HBO’s “The Wire” — another Warner Bros. Discovery property — in which fan-favorite stickup artist Omar Little describes a rival operation as “very sloppy.”
To be Scrupulously Fair, the comparison of Zaslav to Logan Roy is unfair…to Logan Roy, who was at least a competent tyrannical reactionary.
And wait, the story gets even worse:
GQ editor-in-chief Will Welch is producing a movie at Warner Bros. titled “The Great Chinese Art Heist,” which is based on a 2018 GQ article by Alex W. Palmer. Jon M. Chu (“Crazy Rich Asians”) is attached to direct and produce the film, which chronicles an audacious European museum crime wave that targeted Chinese antiquities. The project already has a script in place by Ken Cheng, Jessica Gao and Jimmy O. Yang. Sources say Welch was involved in the discussions surrounding the removal of Bailey’s initial story and made the call to pull the revamped story, which ran some 500 words shorter than the published version. Those same sources say Warner Bros. Discovery complained about the initial story to two GQ editors, one of whom was Welch.
Mutual ivory backscratchers, you might say.