‘NEW LEVEL OF UNHINGED’

Hollywood Producer Scott Rudin Threw a Potato at Worker, Smashed a Computer: Report

Former employees of the Hollywood titan have made terrifying allegations of verbal and physical abuse.

Former employees of big time Hollywood producer Scott Rudin have spoken out to The Hollywood Reporter, describing verbal and physical abuse and a terrifying workplace culture. Rudin, best known for producing The Social Network and Broadway’s To Kill a Mockingbird, has an uncontrollable temper and did things like smash a computer monitor on an assistant’s hand, throw a laptop out of a window, and throw a glass bowl at a colleague, according to the report. “It was a new level of unhinged—a level of lack of control that I had never seen before in a workplace,” said a former assistant, Andrew Coles.

Ryan Nelson, who worked for Rudin three years ago, said “every day was exhausting and horrific.” He said he left the industry completely after Rudin called someone on set a “retard.” Another subordinate recounted a time when Rudin threw a potato at him for not knowing why a guest showed up unexpectedly. He “flipped out... He threw it at me, and I dodged a big potato. He was like, ‘Well, find out [why they’re here,] and get me a new potato,’” the person said. (Barry Diller, chairman of The Daily Beast’s owner IAC, was also a producer of To Kill a Mockingbird.)