One of Martin Scorsese’s assistant costume designers directed it Flower Moon Killer claims that Apple Studios and the Costume Designers Guild worked hand in hand to delete their entry on the multi-nominated film starring Lily Gladstone, Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert DeNiro.
“With numerous nominations for KOTFM“Apple conspired with West and CDG to promote the film and its costume design,” says Kristi Marie Hoffman of the studio, the guild and costume designer Jacqueline West in their six-count lawsuit filed today in Los Angeles Superior Court (read it here).
“Although Hoffman was the principal ACD and did most of the research and costume design for the film, the defendants not only expressly excluded her involvement in the marketing of the film, but also completely ignored her work, instead presenting to the general public that the costume design, her work, was the product of West and a consultant to the film, Julie O’Keefe,” the jury trial document states.
Apple, Apple Studios, West and the Costume Designers Guild are named as defendants in the lawsuit.
An experienced customer Captain America: Civil War and 2015 The Revenant In addition to a number of credits, Hoffman is seeking a number of unspecified damages as well as an injunction against further promotion of the often brutal film, which is based on David Gran’s 2017 book about the Osage murders over 100 years ago.
Apple, which worked with the Osage Nation to promote the awards show and message the film, and CDG did not respond to Deadline’s request for comment on the complaint.
However, given a dispute between the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the defendants settled in 2022 and the controversy surrounding their nomination for the film’s Costume Designers Guild Award in 2023, it is clear that this situation was not unknown to the parties.
Represented by Katie Charleston Law of Huntington Beach, Hoffman claims she was discriminated against on set Flower Moonand has been “targeted” since she spoke about her treatment and the consequences in the film:
Hoffman, who has been working in the television and film industry since 2004 and has worked on many productions, has put her heart and soul into KOTFM as a film about Native Americans that she could identify with as a Native American.
Hoffman suffered discriminatory behavior on set KOTFMas she was subsequently discredited for her work during the film’s promotion and release and was targeted with advertisements celebrating West and O’Keefe for the results of their hard work.
In fact, Apple and CDG worked together to promote Hoffman’s work to West and O’Keefe through sponsored ads without crediting her, but arranged for her to receive the ads through an email campaign. Such actions further compounded the mental and emotional torment of Hoffman’s initial discrimination and later elimination as the principal designer of the film, which received much praise.
Since her EEOC complaint, Hoffman has been targeted by the defendants for her contributions to the film because the defendants promoted West and O’Keefe for their efforts.
The strange thing is that under the current contract of the CDG, which is negotiating with the studios for the next IATSE basic agreement, Hoffman and each ACD are completely under the jurisdiction of the costume designer, in this case West. It also appears that Hoffman, as a member of the guild, does not have the authority to cite the CDG as a defendant.
This is an issue that may come up at CDG’s next general meeting on June 22nd. But given the speed at which justice flows in Los Angeles County’s overburdened courts, this is likely to happen long before the case is heard in Judge Lisa K. Sepe-Wiesenfeld’s courtroom in Santa Monica.