PARTING SHOT
WHEN SHE STARTED INVESTIGATING HARVEY WEINSTEIN’S ABUSE of women, sources told New York Times reporter Jodi Kantor the story wouldn’t matter—“This is the way Hollywood has always been.” What she got was beyond anything she could imagine: the #MeToo movement began with her first Times article on October 5, a story based on reporting by Kantor and her partner, Megan Twohey. (Ronan Farrow’s New Yorker piece followed days later.) Since then, women have found courage—and abusive men have found consequences. Kantor has since broken stories about Louis C.K.’s misconduct, as well as Weinstein’s “machine” of enablers and deniers. She and Twohey are now collaborating on a book chronicling the recent scandals, and they receive daily notes and phone calls from victims around the world. “Sometimes they hope we write about them, but sometimes they just want to be heard,” says Kantor, who is humbled by the response, as well as “staggered, energized, saddened, thunderstruck, moved, troubled and inspired. All of it. Occasionally on the same phone call.”
Illustration by BRITT SPENCER