The stench of the “Weinstein effect” still lingers on Monday, five years after mainstream reports of Harvey Weinstein’s murky sexual reign of terror first came to light.
Author Ken Auletta’s new book, “Hollywood Ending: Harvey Weinstein and the Culture of Silence,” delves deep into the ugly truth of the disgraced film producer’s downfall.
“[He] had an idea in his head that his body was attractive,” the 80-year-old author told Fox News, despite witness testimony that he smelled like feces, had genital scars to the point that they “looked like a vagina” and a back full of ” uncomfortable” blackheads.
Still, “he really thought he was God’s gift, a Don Juan,” added Auletta, who spoke to multiple former Miramax film studio employees, Weinstein prosecutors and even his business partner brother, Bob Weinstein, before the unveiling.
In one chapter, the famed New Yorker magazine media critic recounts how Jessica Mann — a former actress who claimed Weinstein, 70, had raped her — testified in the stands that he smelled like “poop” and that his genitals looked “disfigured.” looked.
“I remember when the prosecutor passed on pictures [at his 2020 trial] …and the judges barely looked at it. They just showed them to the next person. They were that disgusting. They had no interest in looking at these pictures. I remember I kept looking at Harvey. He just sat expressionless in his chair. Sometimes he fell asleep,” Auletta continued.
The Oscar-winning producer of “Shakespeare in Love” is currently serving 23 years in prison after being convicted of rape, assault and a failed attempt to overturn his sentence.
Auletta also told Fox New how Weinstein’s victims were afraid to expose him for fear of his revenge.
“They were afraid of challenging him and being called liars,” Auletta said. “They knew he would attack or punish them. He had enormous power under the press.”
He added that Weinstein was “willing to pay these women a sum of money to keep quiet. And as long as they signed a nondisclosure agreement, they weren’t allowed to tell anyone.”
“In the end he had no pity. He couldn’t understand what he was doing to women,” Auletta added.
Mann testified at Weinstein’s 2020 trial how he raped her in 2013 at the Midtown Manhattan Doubletree hotel. She noted how his genitals were so “disfigured” and that he shot his penis with an erection agent just before their meeting.
“The first time I saw him completely naked, I felt, I thought he was disfigured and intersex,” Mann said during the trial.
“He has an extreme scar that I didn’t know if he might have been a burn victim, but it didn’t add up. He has no testicles and it looks like he has a vagina.”