This is in the news now because Orson Scott Card, who wrote the upcoming"Ender's Game" is a notoriously outspoken homophobe and bigot. His novel espouses almost the opposite values. So should we punish the work and those who love it, simply because the author is a douchebag? Should we punish the thousands of people involved in the making of the movie, many of whom are LGBT?
I'd be interested to hear your thoughts!
SAN DIEGO – As far as pre-Comic-Con publicity kerfuffles go, the lead-up to Ender’s Game‘s arrival at the annual pop culture convention’s was a perfect storm.
First, there was the incident in February when Orson Scott Card—the author of the book on which the film is based—found himself the subject of backlash when fans—citing his anti-gay-marriage views—decried his selection as the author of an upcoming Superman story. Then, at the end of June, the Supreme Court struck down the Defense of Marriage Act and declined to rule on California’s Proposition 8 case—effectively extending many benefits to same-sex couples married in states that allow it and permitting those unions to resume in California.
Shortly after the ruling, a group called Geeks OUT launched an online campaign called “Skip Ender’s Game,” which called on sci-fi fans to not give money to a movie based on Card’s work. The award-winning sci-fi author subsequently issued a statement to Entertainment Weekly calling the same-sex marriage issue “moot” and making a somewhat ironic plea for tolerance. Eventually even Summit Entertainment and its parent company Lionsgate even had to issue a statement distancing itself from Card’s views.
“When Ender’s Game started to go into pre-production there was a lot of chatter about what this meant in terms of his role as a producer,” Geeks OUT board member Patrick Yacco told Wired. “Obviously it was too late to get Lionsgate to change their mind about doing the movie so going into it we knew that Ender’s Game was happening. So we decided in early 2012 to think of ways to draw attention to his homophobia.”
A woman waits for an answer to her question about the controversy over Orson Scott Card after cutting the question line at the Ender’s Game panel at Comic-Con’s Hall H. Photo: Alex Washburn/Wired
Then the dust-up came to the Comic-Con International floor. During the film’s big panel at Hall H Thursday—essentially it’s coming out party for its core fanbase—right after the requisite exclusive clip and banter with moderator Chris Hardwick the first fan to ask a question, who butted in line to ask it, got right to the point. “There’s actually been a lot of controversy about the author of the book,” the young woman said. “How involved was he in making the film?” The response, from the film’s producer Roberto Orci, was direct.
“Obviously, we were first concerned with anyone who might be hurt by anything we were associated with,” Orci said. “But we’ve decided to use the attention to … completely and unequivocally support Lionsgate and Summit’s statement in defense of LGBT rights.”
The room broke out into applause.
Producer Roberto Orci (left) and director Gavin Hood (right) answer questions about Ender’s Game. Photo: Alex Washburn/Wired
But beyond the scene that played out at Comic-Con, the controversy over the adaptation of Card’s book has brought up a whole other host of questions about the relationships between fandom and media. Like, for example, how much does a creator’s personal politics affect how fans feel about the things they create, especially if those things don’t contain said personal politics? Or, say, is it fair for the the results of a movie boycott—lackluster opening weekend, overall loss of revenue—effect people beyond the intended target, like the studio, stars, and filmmakers? And, ultimately, do boycotts get a message across?
In an interesting turn last weekend, LGBT rights advocate and screenwriter Dustin Lance Black—who penned the Harvey Milk biopic Milk and the Prop. 8 play 8–came to the film’s defense saying “boycotting a movie made by 99 percent LGBT equality folks in an LGBT equality industry is a waste of our collective energy.”
And Lionsgate, the studio behind the film, has come out and said, “we obviously do not agree with the personal views of Orson Scott Card.” The studio’s statement also pointed to the discrepancies between Card’s politics and the fairly humanist viewpoints of his novel. “The simple fact is that neither the underlying book nor the film itself reflect these views in any way, shape or form,” the studio said, adding that it planned to host a premiere to benefit the LGBT community.
Director Gavin Hood puts a finer point on the disconnect between Card’s views and his work.
“For me the great themes of the book were, ‘Boy, I need to take responsibility for my own nature. I better find a way to be tolerant, compassionate, empathetic, and empathize with people who are different than me,” Hood told Wired. “Then I find the author is now expressing these very, in my view, intolerant views—where did all of that empathy go?”
Ultimately, it’s hard to tell what effect a boycott could have on Card himself. Originally Stop Ender’s Game‘s website asked “Do you really want to give this guy your money?” But it’s unclear if in giving over the rights to his book for a film adaptation he made a deal that will give him proceeds from ticket sales (Orci told Wired he was unsure of the particulars of Card’s book-option deal). Yacco notes, though, that if the film does well it could lead to future Card books getting optioned.
But there’s another side to the coin, Orci notes. “If people are going to do a cost-benefit analysis of who profits it’s the 667 people on this movie credited directly plus the other couple thousand that are part of the industry that helped release it,” he said – people that Hood added were “gay and straight, male and female, old and young.”
And a boycott, if successful, could potentially have another side effect in that if the movie performs poorly at the box office it may be hard to parse if that’s because LGBT rights advocates stayed home or because it was of a certain flavor of sci-fi that audiences just didn’t go for. It’s the same fear that’s crept up this summer amidst lackluster ticket sales for movies like Pacific Rim: If genre pictures cease performing well, eventually studios might just stop funding them. Then no one wins.
But with Ender’s Game, winning is kind of a big deal. There are many ways the film and the boycott against it could succeed or fail. The movie could do well—leading to more sci-fi films, potentially even those originally penned by Card, getting green-lit. LGBT rights advocates could not exercise the “tolerance” Card asked for and succeed in a boycott, causing the film to flop. All this heat on Card for his anti-same-sex-marriage views could even lead to an examination of conscience on his part. But that seems less likely.
However, regardless of the outcome, yesterday—at a panel for the movie adaptation of the most well-known book by the man who has become sci-fi’s most well-known crusader against gay marriage—someone said “LGBT rights” and the largest meeting room at Comic-Con broke out in applause.
The topic of rehabilitation--redemptino is too charged theologically--is something lurking as a theme in my current WIP, so it's been on my mind too.
