Mahershala Ali and Viggo Mortensen in Green Book.
Courtesy of Universal Pictures/Participant/DreamWorks.
Screenwriter Nick Vallelonga—who co-wrote Green Book with director Peter Farrelly and Brian Hayes Currie—is apologizing for his controversial 2015 tweet to Donald Trump that reinforced one of the president’s most offensive conspiracy theories.
“I want to apologize. I spent my life trying to bring this story of overcoming differences and finding common ground to the screen, and I am incredibly sorry to everyone associated with Green Book,” Vallelonga said in a statement. “I especially, deeply apologize to the brilliant and kind Mahershala Ali, and all member[s] of the Muslim faith, for the hurt I have caused. I am also sorry to my late father who changed so much from Dr. Shirley’s friendship, and I promise this lesson is not lost on me. Green Book is a story about love, acceptance, and overcoming barriers, and I will do better.”
Participant Media, a company founded on the premise of making movies with socially relevant themes—and the producers behind Green Book—issued its own statement condemning the actions of the screenwriter.
“We find Mr. Vallelonga’s Twitter post offensive, dangerous, and antithetical to Participant Media’s values. We reject it in no uncertain terms,” said a Participant Media spokesperson.
The company declined further comment.
The tweet has the potential to upend the momentum behind Green Book and its quest for awards consideration. The period piece, which tracks the unlikely friendship between an African-American musician, Dr. Don Shirley (Ali), and Vallelonga’s Italian-American father, Tony (“Lip”) Vallelonga (Viggo Mortensen), walked away with three Golden Globe wins this past Sunday. Farrelly was nominated for a Directors Guild award earlier in the week and the Producers Guild nominated Green Book as one of its 10 best pictures of the year.
The film had already prompted outrage from the Shirley family, who called the depiction of the late pianist “a symphony of lies.” But a defense of the film emerged recently that centered on the younger Vallelonga himself, a devoted son who wanted to tell the story of his father’s transformation during his road trip with Shirley, from a narrow-minded bouncer to a compassionate ally. It may have been limited in scope, and therefore in the depiction of Shirley himself, but that was due more to the younger Vallelonga honoring the wishes of Shirley—who asked Vallelonga to limit his film to just the road trip he took with his father—and less about Vallelonga marginalizing the black character of the film.
That defense, though, becomes harder to support if Vallelonga’s world view is aligned with Trump’s nativist agenda.
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This story was originally published by Vanity Fair
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