Mom, is that you? Well, kinda…
Former talk show host and ex-Fox News personality Megyn Kelly broke her silence about the new film Bombshell, which stars Charlize Theron as her, after finally watching it. The movie focuses on women who accused conservative cable news channel’s CEO Roger Ailes of sexual misconduct. Ailes, who denied the allegations, left the company in 2016 and died in 2017.
Theron is joined in the film by Nicole Kidman, who plays Gretchen Carlson, and Margot Robbie, who plays a fictional Fox News producer. Theron and Robbie were recently nominated for Golden Globes for their roles. On Friday, Kelly shared on her Instagram page a photo of her 6-year-old son Thatcher, the youngest of her three boys, looking at a Bombshell poster, which shows the three actresses in character.
“My husband @dougbrunt and I recently took our three kids to see the movie Frozen 2,” she wrote. ”As we walked into the theatre, our 6-year-old stopped at this poster promoting another movie hitting the big screen. The ad confused him because it appears to show a picture of me.”
“But while the movie Bombshell is loosely based on my experience during the sexual harassment scandal at Fox News, I have nothing to do with this film,” Kelly continued, in what marked her first major comments about the film. “I did not sell the rights to my story or book and only got my first look at the film once it was past the point of any possible edits, though there are certainly some I would have made.”
She added, “Watching this picture was an incredibly emotional experience for me, and for those with whom I saw it. Sexual harassment is pervasive in this country; it can leave scars that do not heal. My heart goes out to those who’ve gone through it, who I hope might find some comfort in this story. As for my thoughts about the film, I’ll have more soon.”
In September, Kelly told DailyMail.com in an on-camera interview that she did not know anything about Bombshell. She said she was a “fan” of Theron, adding that the actress “Seems smart, seems like a good mom” and saying, ”You could do worse.”
She said she had not yet decided if she will watch Bombshell and that she has also not watched Showtime’s 2019 miniseries The Loudest Voice, which also focused on Ailes’ sex scandals, and starred Russell Crowe and Sienna Miller. It made mention of Kelly but feature a character onscreen.