NICOLA Sturgeon has responded to a Hollywood actor after he called her a “witch” and claimed she ruined Scotland’s art sector.
Actor Rupert Everett, known for his role in My Best Friend’s Wedding and the voice of Prince Charming in the Shrek franchise, called the former first minister “a witch” when discussing the record of the SNP with the arts.
In an interview with The Herald, the actor – who moved to Glasgow when he was 18 to work at the Citizens Theatre in Glasgow – compared his time at the theatre with now, saying in the 1970s “it had a global outlook”.
He said: “It was a national European theatre … it never ran at a loss. It presented an uncompromising array of work to people that it never patronised.
“As soon as the witch Sturgeon came into power everything changed in Scottish arts and everything had to be about being Scottish.”
Writing on Instagram, Sturgeon said: “What is it with [some] men who can’t disagree with a woman without resorting to deeply misogynistic tropes? His substantive point is baseless rubbish too.”
Upcoming shows at the theatre include Small Acts of Love, set in Lockerbie in the wake of the 1988 Pan AM bombing, and a show about Glasgow’s “first unofficial gay bar”.
The Glass Menagerie, a Tennessee Williams play set in St Louis; Sweat, set in a rust belt town in Pennsylvania; and the English actor Kieran Hodgson impersonating “a bunch of old prospectors and former presidents” in a stand-up set called Voice of America are also set to be shown.
In May, Sturgeon said misogyny is potentially worse now than it was when she first started out in politics more than 20 years ago.
The former first minister’s comments came after senior MPs called for a drastic overhaul of Westminster's culture amid concerns over sexism and inappropriate behaviour by politicians.
She said she felt social media had handed sexist men a platform to hurl direct abuse at women in a way they couldn't previously.
And, Sturgeon said it has led to some comments being much worse than they would've been in previous decades because people can hide behind a computer.
She told GMB at the time: "I don’t think there is a woman alive, not just in politics but in any walk of life, who will not have experienced somewhere on the spectrum of misogyny and sexism behaviour which is unacceptable.
"For many, including myself, that will be at the end of the spectrum that is inappropriate comments and a sense of a culture of sexism, men making comments about what you wear and your hair and stuff.
"Of course, for some women, that goes to the other end of the spectrum and involves serious sexual assault and sometimes murder, so it's a societal problem.
"It can be worse in politics and public life.
“In some ways, I think it is worse today than it was when I was a woman starting out in politics."
Sturgeon also said the SNP had struggled to get women to put themselves forward as candidates in the local election because of sexism in society and politics.
She added: “In this election, my party – and I think it will be the same for other parties – have found it more difficult than at any election I remember to persuade women to come forward because there’s a sense that politics is not a safe space.”
