Speaking to Vanity Fair in a recent interview, bombshell 27-year-old actress Sydney Sweeney slammed Hollywood messaging about women “empowering” each other in the industry, saying that those claims are entirely fake, which is quite unfortunate for young actresses like her.
As background, Sweeney’s comments came when she was asked about claims from other actresses, namely Jennifer Lawrence and Anne Hathaway, who have said that there is a great deal of infighting amongst women in Hollywood, and that female performers tend to knock down each other at their professional peak.
Further, Sweeney was attacked earlier this year by film producer Carol Baum, who said, as The Daily Mail reported, “I wanted to know who she is and why everybody’s talking about her. I watched this unwatchable movie — sorry to people who love this movie — (this) romantic comedy where they hate each other.” Baum added, “I said to my class, ‘Explain this girl to me. She’s not pretty. She can’t act. Why is she so hot?’”
Sweeney, in any case, commented on the matter to Vanity Fair and noted how real and disheartening the issue is. She said, “It’s very disheartening to see women tear other women down, especially when women who are successful in other avenues of their industry see younger talent working really hard—hoping to achieve whatever dreams that they may have—and then trying to bash and discredit any work that they’ve done.”
Continuing, she noted that the messaging about the internal dynamics of the industry is the opposite of true, saying, “This entire industry, all people say is ‘Women empowering other women.’ None of it’s happening. All of it is fake and a front for all the other sh*t that they say behind everyone’s back.”
Sweeney further added, “I mean, there’s so many studies and different opinions on the reasoning behind it. I’ve read that our entire lives, we were raised—and it’s a generational problem—to believe only one woman can be at the top. There’s one woman who can get the man. There’s one woman who can be, I don’t know, anything.”
Sweeney further noted, “So then all the others feel like they have to fight each other or take that one woman down instead of being like, Let’s all lift each other up. I’m still trying to figure it out. I’m just trying my best over here. Why am I getting attacked?” Watch her speak to Vanity Fair here:
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Baum, for reference, was torched by Sweeney’s representative for her comments about the young actress. The rep said, in a statement to USA Today, “How sad that a woman in the position to share her expertise and experience chooses instead to attack another woman.”
Further, the actress’s rep told the news outlet that Baum’s comments were “shameful,” saying, “If that’s what she’s learned in her decades in the industry and feels is appropriate to teach to her students, that’s shameful. To unjustly disparage a fellow female producer speaks volumes about Ms. Baum’s character.”