Roger Ailes was the CEO and chairman of Fox News until he was forced to resign following allegations of sexual harassment in 2016.

In the upcoming and highly anticipated film, Bombshell, Charlize Theron stars as Megyn Kelly and Nicole Kidman as Gretchen Carlson, two of the women who took on Ailes and eventually got him removed from his position of power at Fox.

Megyn Kelly is a controversial character. Fox News isn’t known for its unbiased reporting, and its hosts have often fallen victim to ‘foot-in-mouth’ disease.

Donald Trump famously called Kelly a ‘bimbo’ in 2015 in a tweet that caused public outrage and further investigation into Donald Trump’s historical mistreatment of women.

So when Kelly was given the chance to interview Trump in 2016, and she let him off with a little ‘slap on the wrist’, Trevor Noah was quick to point out she’d let him off the hook.

Other terrible life choices in Kelly’s history include the time she defended ‘blackface’ and was consequently fired from NBC. She also announced to the world that pepper spray is essentially a food group. 

It follows that, all things considered, Charlize Theron was a little uncomfortable playing Kelly in the film. Here’s The Daily Mail with what she had to say about the role.

‘I loved when Megyn took it to Trump. I admired her sharpness, her wit. She was fearless. But when my production company received the script for Bombshell, I was conflicted about playing her. I personally felt uncomfortable with some of the stuff that she’s said.’

‘Ultimately, I understood her strength and ambition. Megyn herself says “I know I’m tough” – and that’s something I’ve heard about myself.

Theron went on to talk about the difficulties faced by women in the workplace.

‘For women to be betrayed in their workplace by a mentor who is going to make your career possible is very confusing. The water is murky.

‘I love the nuance of that in our film. We don’t tell the story of the perfect victims of Fox. We try to tell the story of the messy, emotional dynamics between boss and employee. In Bombshell our monsters don’t always look like monsters, which is how it is in real life’.

That’s a sneaky little reference to Charlize’s last Oscar-winning performance as Aileen Wuornos in Monster. Nicely played.

You can catch Bombshell in theatres on January 24, 2020.

[source:dailymail]