Hollywood producer Carol Baum doesn’t get the hype around Sydney Sweeney.
“There’s an actress that everybody loves now — Sydney Sweeney,” Baum said during a screening of her 1988 film Dead Ringers, per the Daily Mail. “I don’t get Sydney Sweeney. I was watching on the plane Sydney Sweeney’s movie because I wanted to watch it. I wanted to know who she is and why everybody’s talking about her.”
Baum was referring to Sweeney, 26, and Glen Powell’s romantic comedy, Anyone But You, which is loosely based on William Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing. Sweeney was also a producer of the film, which Baum deemed “unwatchable.”
“I said to my class, ‘Explain this girl to me. She’s not pretty, she can’t act. Why is she so hot?’” Baum said, recalling a discussion with her students at The University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts. “Nobody had an answer, but then the question was asked, ‘Well, if you could get your movie made because she was in it, would you do it?’”
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She continued: “I said, ‘Well, that’s a really good question … that’s a very hard question to answer because we all want to get the movie made and who walks away from a green light? Nobody I know. Your job is to get the movie made.’”
Sweeney’s rep subsequently clapped back at Baum, saying in a statement to Page Six on Wednesday, April 17, “How sad that a woman in the position to share her expertise and experience chooses instead to attack another woman. If that’s what she’s learned in her decades in the industry and feels is appropriate to teach to her students, that’s shameful.”
Baum — whose producing credits include 1991’s Father of the Bride and 1992’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer — isn’t the only Hollywood figure who has been outspoken against Anyone But You, which was released in December 2023. Actress Geraldine Viswanathan expressed a desire to see more diverse casting within the romantic comedy genre.
“I definitely have an appetite for rom-coms, and, you know, an appetite for watching people who don’t necessarily look like Sydney Sweeney and Glen Powell falling in love,” Viswanathan, 28, said in an interview with The Independent in March. “I want to revamp that and just see more diversity in these stories.”
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Viswanathan shared that she’s “here” for the “rom-com resurgence,” but she hopes people of color will receive more opportunities to be on screen. “From the outside looking in, I do think it’s a bit more unusual to see a woman of color in that role,” she told the outlet. “I just finished watching [the Netflix miniseries] One Day. So I’m like, ‘Go off!’”
While there have been some critics of Anyone But You, the film earned $200 million at the worldwide box office.
“You guys are the best,” Sweeney wrote via her Instagram Story in January after learning of the movie’s box office numbers. “I know I keep saying this, but I honestly can’t thank you enough for continuously sharing your love for this film.”