By Fiona Ng, Hollywood.com Staff
HOLLYWOOD, October 13, 2000 -- Call him Gary Oldman, political analyst-cultural police.
The titular co-star of "The Contender," set to open this very night, has opened fire on the film in the newest issue of Premiere magazine, according to a report by Mr. Showbiz.
The character actor, British by nationality and a conservative Republican by choice, is blasting DreamWorks, the studio behind "The Contender," for manipulating it into a pro-Democrat film.
Specifically, Oldman says that DreamWorks, because of the Democratic leanings of the studios' top brasses (that's Steven Spielberg, David Geffen and Jeffrey Katzenberg), had forced writer-director Rod Lurie to change the script to suit their political beliefs.
"There's no indication to me whatsoever that Rod [Lurie] ever felt pressured," DreamWorks spokesman Walter Parkes told Premiere.
"One only has to look at the coverage of the [Democratic] convention to see that the owners of this company have sympathies with the Democratic Party.
Did those sympathies enter into the editorial process ... or the decision to buy the movie?
Unequivocally, no." With that, the battle rages on.
Interesting that (conservative republican) Oldman's first splash was playing doomed Punk Rocker Sid Vicious.