'Hillbilly Elegy' director: 'There's no version of me voting for Donald Trump'

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: The Hill

09/07/24 5:48 PM ET


The director of the 2020 movie based on Ohio Sen. JD Vance’s (R) book, “Hillbilly Elegy,” said that he won’t be casting a vote for former President Trump despite Vance being his VP in a video posted Saturday.

“There’s no version of me voting for Donald Trump to be president again, whoever the Vice President was,” Ron Howard said in a video from Variety.

Howard had previously said in 2022 that he was “surprised by some of the positions [Vance has] taken and statements he’s made.”

“I always knew he was conservative, but [he] struck me as a very center-right, a kind of a moderate thinker,” Howard told The Hollywood Reporter at the time.

Read more: https://thehill.com/blogs/in-the-know/4867781-hillbilly-elegy-director-donald-trump-vance/

[FarPoint]

1. Ron Howard has always been a compassionate Liberal.

I sure do appreciate him expressing his opinion now. I don't recall him ever speaking up when Vance ran for Senate in Ohio.

[TexasBushwhacker]

2. Howard isn't from Ohio

As he said, the JD he knew was conservative, but not particularly radical. . Lots of people from Appalachia are conservative.

[FarPoint]

6. I am very familiar that Ron Howard is not from Ohio....

My reference was that of the movie, Hilly Elgin??? Made in Middletown Ohio by Ron Howard...

Ron Howard never spoke up when Vance ran for the Senate and won here in Ohio....so we Democrats suffer...

I unfortunately live 30 miles from Middletown...

I believe Ron Howard speaking out 2 years ago could of helped...maybe not as MAGA's proliferate in Ohio rural area's. I was actually waiting for him to speak up then....no such luck.

[onetexan]

3. The one thing the director didn't get right

Was that power corrupts, & absolute power corrupts absolutely. When this moron vapid vance got elected to the senate, his greed for power grew, to the point he was willing to sell his soul to the devil.

[Marcuse]

4. Opie Cunningham is right.

[jaxexpat]

7. Yeah? What does Richie Taylor have to say about it?

[TNNurse]

5. It is about damn time. I have been waiting for anyone

involved in that movie to speak out and maybe apologize.

[AZLD4Candidate]

8. yet you sold your soul to direct his bullshit turd book movie adaption. Sorry, Opie, but you had your chance

You could have declined directing and let some right wing turd direct it. Clint Eastwood comes to mind. But when money and paycheck is involved, Hollywood loses his social conscience.

JLo performed a private set to Putin. Beyonce did it for Qaddafi.

[FakeNoose]

11. I think JD Vance probably disguised his political leanings to Ron Howard

When "Hillbilly Elegy" was written, Vance most likely had no clue that he would later become a US Senator, or ever run for VP. I haven't read his book but I understand that some - or much - of the sentiment towards his family was faked in order to plump up the story and make it a bestseller.

It's doubtful that Vance's family is even speaking to him any more. Ron Howard probably got the same fake attitudes from Vance that his own family got.

It's not Ron Howard's fault that JD Vance is a complete asswipe, and now the whole world knows it.

[Escurumbele]

16. I know people who were involved in the movie, your statement is unfair and not true, the Vance they met

before and during the movie is NOT the the same guy he is today.

I read the book and saw the movie, Vance is a different person that he was then, or that he pretended to be. Unless you know Ron Howard "sold his soul", which he doesn't have to, he doesn't need the money, instead of a director who believed in the book and the person who Vance seemed to be at the time, and not a con man as he seems to be now, then tell us how you arrived at that conclusion please, its good to know.

[AZLD4Candidate]

17. Being in the business since 2015, everyone in the business is for sale to the highest bidder

Those who hold onto their conviction tend to go nowhere in it. I lost a chance for a big producer and director to make my award winning Camp Grant Massacre biopic because they both wanted me to re-write the ending to make it a happy ending. They were offering 2% of the budget for the upfront fee and 5% of the profits on the backend. I walked out because I would not disrespect native Americans by rewriting history to make rich white people wealthier.

Same with my Rape of Nanking biopic. My agent got a Japanese film company to finance. After I refused, they offered me, on the final offer, $750,000 and 10% of the profits to make it, so long as I allowed them to make edits to make it more "marketable," meaning they wanted to whitewash their responsibility in it and the history of it. I refused and didn't sign the deal.

I know plenty of people with my same history. Convictions get sacrificed, no matter how "important" or "wealthy" you are. The powers behind the scenes will get what they want or you, stupid artist/actor/writer/singer/dancer/model, will be passed over, no matter WHO you are.

[jvill]

9. The naive, provincial arrogance displayed in this thread of comments is... impressive.

Expecting people from a movie to “apologize” for making it has got to be one of the whiniest things ever posted on this site, and that’s saying a lot.

It’s chronic victimization like this, almost utterly devoid of agency, that makes being a democrat a backup default option, rather thsn something to which people aspire.

[FakeNoose]

10. I can't imagine Ron Howard ever voting R

... regardless of what movies he has directed. Regardless of whom he has met in Hollywood. Ron Howard is a liberal and a Democrat through and through. It's probably one of the reasons his movies are so wonderful.

[andym]

12. Ron Howard for Obama video

--------
Keep in mind that not everything a filmmaker does has to be have a political angle. The Hillbilly Ellegy film wasn't made as a political act.

[ificandream]

13. I'd forgotten about that.

I hope he does something like that this year.

[IronLionZion]

14. Vance's beliefs are completely fake

he's just pandering to Trump and MAGA voters while not actually believing in anything. He says outrageous things to get publicity and then pretend to be a victim of the liberal media.

[ZonkerHarris]

15. Howard's worst movie ever!