I heard about the Wood / Douglas incident only a couple weeks ago on a radio program. I've heard plenty about the conspiracies surrounding Natalie's death, but never heard she'd been raped.
I heard a lot about Jerry Lewis both before & after his death (such as his not leaving anything in his will to certain of his children), but never heard an accusation of rape until recently.
Interesting analogy, and indeed the larger issues SHOULD take precedence... but that's only if they are true. If they're not true, than spreading falsehoods would be the larger issue. Unfortunately for most of these claims, we'll never know.
You make some good points. Unfortunate initial examples however.
The Douglas men (father and son) have always reeked of predation to me, and I've never been a fan of either. I am NOT Spartacus.
Lewis is more complicated, as while he was a bitter, vicious, entitled monster even as a young man, he was also undoubtedly a genius.
For me, this Vanity Fair promoted story about wild gay Hollywood doings, all involving dead celebrities, is truly ripe for your criticism.
https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood...harine-hepburn
As the nutbag hoarder who made these claims himself said, he'd never have brought any of it up when they were alive. But in the "if someone says it and we can make money from promoting it then it must be true" world of modern journalistic malpractice, it's forever out there, ridiculous as it is.
So yeah, I get your point, but the Wood incident in particular muddied the issue for me.
I'd add that as far as spoiling enjoyment of art goes, Woody Allen lost me as a viewer and fan when he took up with Mia's charge, and her subsequent allegations involving Dylan further soured me. And everybody's still alive there.
Kevin Spacey, Jeremy Piven and George Takei among others have been very credibly accused of varying degrees of misconduct as well, and all still alive too.
There's just no firewall between humanity's evils and art. Quite the opposite in fact. Even Star Trek isn't safe! I call it the Riefenstahl Conundrum, though Wagner or Picasso could be substituted. How does one parse the person, their deeds and their art? Is it possible? Kevin Spacey is a highly effective film creep because he's Kevin Spacey. American Beauty.
The good news is that fresh art's being made all the time, so as soon as one idol's clay feet are revealed, new ones pop up. They can be toppled later, maybe even justifiably.