Harvey Weinstein: Big Jerk

I'm not sure if you guys have been following this whole Harvey Weinstein/Scott Rudin email scandal - but it's delicious! Harvey Weinstein has long been known as one of the biggest a$$holes in showbiz, but the latest allegations thrown at him are really bad. Nikki Finke writes a great Hollywood insider blog called Deadline Hollywood Dailyand she always gets GREAT scoop. Finke got her hands on an email Scott Rudin sent that accuses Weinstein of not only badgering a dying Sydney Pollack but also recently deceased Anthony Minghella's widow over the release date of their most recent movie, "The Reader."

Harvey insisted he didn't do these ghastly things...but Nikki Finke posted the email and Scott Rudin admitted it was real. Now Harvey Weinstein has to put his money where his mouth is! Read all about it!
NOTE to Harvey Weinstein - you owe some deserving charity a cool $1 million and you owe Page Six a big fat apology after being caught in a bald-faced lie.

The Weinstein Company honcho swore up and down to us the other day that an e-mail written by producer Scott Rudin - claiming Weinstein ghoulishly badgered cancer-stricken Oscar-winner Sydney Pollack and the widow of another co-producer, Anthony Minghella, to rush them to finish the romantic drama "The Reader" - was a complete fake. Weinstein even had his sycophantic spin-masters get Rudin to call us and insist he didn't write the e-mail, which was quoted by Nikki Finke on DeadlineHollywoodDaily.com.

But when we told Finke that both men had declared the e-mail bogus - and that Weinstein even offered $1 million to charity if she could produce it - she scanned and posted a copy on her Web site and spoke to Rudin.

"Rudin confirmed to me Monday night that it is his e-mail describing Harvey Weinstein's alleged callous treatment . . ." she reported yesterday. "Rudin also claimed to me that HW's people all day pestered him 'to protect Harvey and deny the e-mail and lie to Page Six' - so he told me he did 'in order to keep peace for the next weeks that the two of us still have to work together on 'The Reader.' "

Neither Weinstein nor Rudin would speak with us directly yesterday, but Weinstein's rep says that once he's verified the authenticity of the Rudin e-mail, he will donate $1 million to the Robin Hood Foundation. Weinstein issued a statement: "There's been enough back and forth on this subject. I have nothing but a tremendous amount of respect for Scott Rudin and it's time to move on. This is my final statement on this matter."

We don't believe it for a second, since the bitterness between the two goes way back. An insider said: "When they were making 'The Hours,' Scott sent Harvey an enormous box of cartons and cartons of cigarettes and a note that read, "Die!' "
(Source: Page Six)