Jodi Kantor on the "Deep Throat" of the New York Times' Harvey Weinstein investigation
In the fall of 2017, New York Times reporters Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey published a series of stories exposing allegations of sexual harassment and assault against Harvey Weinstein, igniting the #MeToo movement. Now, the pair is revealing new details about the Hollywood producer's alleged enablers, and the sources who brought the stories to light — including a Weinstein accountant that Kantor described as the "Deep Throat" of the story.
"Irwin Reiter, we can finally disclose now, was kind of the 'Deep Throat' of the Harvey Weinstein investigation," Kantor said Monday on "CBS This Morning." "He had worked for Weinstein for 30 years. He had seen glimpses of wrongdoing over the years, had not acted, had not done anything about it. Like a lot of people, he had kind of dismissed it, until around late 2014 when he started to have mounting concerns about what was going on in the company. And for two years, he basically tried to act and he failed; he was not successful, he was not able."
When Kantor called him in September 2017, he "very nervously" agreed to meet, she said. But she had her doubts, too — that "he might be a Weinstein spy."
But eventually, Kantor said, "he started to tell me about more recent wrongdoing at the Weinstein Company. He was talking about things that had happened in 2014, 2015, and eventually he provided a document to us that really became key to publishing the story."
Since Kantor and Twohey broke the news about Weinstein paying settlements to multiple women, more than 80 women have come forward with allegations against the media mogul. Weinstein continues to deny all of the allegations and insists the encounters were consensual.
The revelation about Reiter's role in the investigation is one of many previously unknown details that appear in Kantor and Twohey's new book, "She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement."
The book also discusses the role of another key source for the pair: actress Gwyneth Paltrow. Kantor said Monday that Paltrow's cooperation came as a surprise.
"When we were starting out, I barely thought we should call her, because I thought she was Harvey's biggest star, and also, she's not an activist type, she's not going to talk to us," Kantor said. "And in fact, when almost nobody else in Hollywood would pick up the phone, when only a few other people, like Ashley Judd, were really helping us, Gwyneth told us her story of predation with Harvey Weinstein, told us how he threatened her and she was afraid she was gonna lose those critical early roles."
Kantor added that Weinstein seemed to be "obsessed" with whether Paltrow was speaking to her and Twohey.
"At one point, I actually got a panicked phone call from her, she was hiding in her bathroom from Harvey Weinstein," Kantor said. "Because he had showed up to her house. She knew he was coming to the party, but he showed up early, and that was really scary."
The book also reveals that Harvey Weinstein's brother and business partner, Bob, wrote Harvey a letter two years before The Times broke the story. In the letter, Bob reportedly wrote, "You have brought shame to the family and your company through your misbehavior."
"One of the lingering mysteries that we wanted to dig deeper on is 'what was Bob Weinstein's role?'" Kantor said. "He was his brother, he was his cofounder of these two companies, and Megan Twohey, my partner, sat down with Bob for a series of really reflective interviews. And we also were able to publish this very long, searching letter that he wrote to his brother."
Harvey Weinstein's lawyer said in a letter: "'She Says' (sic) is all you need to know to appreciate that this book contains one sided allegations without having adequately investigated the facts of each situation. There is [a] very different side to every story."
Kantor responded, "What I would say to that is, first of all, we really describe in the book how we check each allegation, whether it's somebody who's a Hollywood star, whether it's a former assistant who doesn't have a big name, we make sure that there's corroboration for every one of these stories." She added, "I hope it goes without saying that you just don't put charges this serious right in the newspaper or right in a book."