 Responding to repeated Tweets from Rose McGowan that called her a hypocrite for planning to wear black at the Academy Awards to show unity with women who have been sexually assaulted and abused, actress Meryl Streep just sent out a public statement telling McGowan that they are actually on the same side “standing in defiance of the same implacable foe.” 
 
 McGowan’s series of tweets over the weekend also took Streep to task for calling disgraced mogul Harvey Weinstein’s behavior “disgraceful” instead of calling it “a crime” and for remaining silent and continuing to work for the man. Here is Streep’s statement in full: 
 
 “It hurt to be attacked by Rose McGowan in banner headlines this weekend, but I want to let her know I did not know about Weinstein’s crimes, not in the 90s when he attacked her, or through subsequent decades when he proceeded to attack others. The three-time Oscar winner said she wasn’t “deliberately silent” but did not even know of Weinstein’s behavior. He needed me much more than I needed him and he made sure I didn’t know. I don’t tacitly approve of rape. I don’t like young women being assaulted. I didn’t know this was happening.” 
 
 Streep added that she had only visited Weinstein’s office one time in 1998 for a meeting with director Wes Craven for Music of the Heart, and that she had “never in my life been invited to his hotel room.” 
 
 She also pointed out that Weinstein was more of a producer and marketer of movies, rather than a filmmaker, meaning that not every actor associated with him knew details about his personal life. That’s why a legal defense fund for victims is currently being assembled to which hundreds of good hearted people in our business will contribute, to bring down the bastards, and help victims fight this scourge within. “Rose assumed and broadcast something untrue about me, and I wanted to let her know the truth," Streep said. “Through friends who know her, I got my home phone number to her the minute I read the headlines. I sat by that phone all day yesterday and this morning, hoping to express both my deep respect for her and others’ bravery in exposing the monsters among us, and my sympathy for the untold, ongoing pain she suffers.” 
 
 “And, I hoped that she would give me a hearing,” she continued. “She did not, but I hope she reads this. I am truly sorry she sees me as an adversary, because we are both, together with all the women in our business, standing in defiance of the same implacable foe: a status quo that wants so badly to return to the bad old days -- the old ways where women were used, abused and refused entry into the decision-making, top levels of the industry. That’s where the cover-ups convene. Those rooms must be disinfected, and integrated, before anything even begins to change.” 
 
 After Streep’s statement was released, McGowan tweeted again, this time apologizing for at her dig at Weinstein’s estranged wife’s fashion line, Marchesa.
– Meryl Streep says she is "truly sorry" that Rose McGowan seems to see her as an "adversary," because they are on the same side against movie industry "bastards" like Harvey Weinstein and other "entitled bosses." In a public statement issued in response to McGowan's attack on a plan to wear black to the Golden Globes in protest, Streep stresses that she was not "deliberately silent" about Weinstein's attack on McGowan in the '90s or his other crimes, Deadline reports. "I don't tacitly approve of rape. I didn't know," she writes. "I don't like young women being assaulted. I didn't know this was happening." She says she has never been to Weinstein's home or hotel room and has only visited his office once. Weinstein, Streep writes, distributed movies she made with other people, and he "needed me much more than I needed him and he made sure I didn't know." She adds that she has been hoping to speak to McGowan to express her "deep respect for her and others' bravery in exposing the monsters among us." She says a legal defense fund is being assembled "to bring down the bastards, and help victims fight this scourge within." In a now-deleted tweet, McGowan called Streep a hypocrite for "happily working" with the "Pig Monster." She has not publicly responded to Streep's statement, though she tweeted Monday that she is sorry about suggesting celebrity protesters should wear Marchesa, the fashion line co-founded by Weinstein's estranged wife, Entertainment Tonight reports.