Celebrity

Why We Should All Be Supporting Rose McGowan Right Now

She was fired for speaking up about sexism, but has moved forward with effortless grace.
by 9/5/2015

Rose McGowan burst onto the scene in 1996 with Scream, then won over countless fans as the most sharp-tongued and sarcastic spirit animal sister in Charmed. After a high-profile relationship with Marilyn Manson, and a series of notable magazine covers, McGowan seemed nearly unstoppable. Fast forward to 2015, and she found herself fired by her agent and nearly blacklisted from Tinsel Town.

OK, let’s rewind a bit. Rose grew up in Italy as part of a religious cult known as Children of God, but moved to America at 10. By 15, she had already left home as a newly emancipated teen hoping to make it big in Los Angeles. As her Hollywood career began, McGowan became eponymous with a young sex symbol in Hollywood. She was funny, cool, and intelligent.

Then on June 18 of this year, McGowan tweeted a casting note for a script she received that was pretty, well, f’d up.

The media and Hollywood alike eat up a star calling out industry sexism, racism, and ageism…until it gets specific. It’s trendy and “slay-worthy” if Scarlett Johansson, Jennifer Lawrence, or Anne Hathaway refer to double standards blanketly, but this wasn’t a cute interview soundbyte. This wasn’t even the first time that McGowan spoke up about sexism. The tweet seemed like more of a joke than anything else, a joke she was entirely too used to as a woman in Hollywood, but it was a pointed one at a specific and powerful male star in the industry (Adam Sandler, in case you didn’t catch that).

In the coming days there were a handful of half-sarcastic responses to her followers, but then this happened.

McGowan could have deleted her tweet, played it down, or begged for forgiveness, but she stood strong with the mindset of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯, but that doesn’t mean she won in the court of public opinion. On Twitter, rather than being widely supported, she was shamed and forced to defend herself.

F the Haters.

And then there were some members of the media proved her point so well.

Don’t feel too bad for Rose, though, she didn’t stop and ask for anyone’s pity party. She’s remained strong throughout the entire ordeal, while inspiring others along the way.

After being pretty fed up, McGowan began to seek work behind-the-camera. Her short film Dawn was entered in competition at Sundance in 2014 and told the story of female sexuality in the 1960s. Her first attempt at a feature-length will manifest itself in next year’s The Pines, which is being produced by Tangerine Entertainment, a company that centers on female directors.

In an interview with Indiewire around this time, she stated that she was over acting. “I don’t have two months to be somebody else,” McGowan said. “When you’re somebody else for 12–15 hour days your own brain is on the brink. I’m no longer willing to take time off from my own mind. So in that regard I don’t think I’ll miss it.”

Finally, media outlets have begun to champion around McGowan. When MTV spoke with the director she said that she initially feared she would be blacklisted from Hollywood after her tweet, before declaring war. Similar interviews were conducted by the Observer and BuzzFeed, cementing her place as a women’s activist who is tired of the bullshit.

In honor of a new direction in her life and refusal to put up with Hollywood’s bullshit, we’re standing with Rose, reminding ourselves…

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