The other day, I made my first mistake: checking Twitter for trending topics. I noticed one trending term was “Zapruder,” presumably a reference to the famous footage showing the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Thinking there was some new development or theory, I clicked the trending topic to see what people were talking about.
However, nobody was talking about how Lee Harvey Oswald shot at JFK. Instead, everyone was talking about an alleged incident at the Venice Film Festival after the premiere of Don’t Worry Darling. A video clip appeared to show one star of the movie, Harry Styles, spitting on fellow star Chris Pine as he walked by.
Like everyone else, I ended up watching the clip over and over as if I was studying the real Zapruder footage. So, did Harry Styles really spit on Captain Kirk himself? Keep reading to find out!
The incident in question
How did this all start? Last week, a clip from the Venice Film Festival went viral. In the clip, Chris Pine and film director Olivia Wilde are sitting next to each other. Harry Styles walks over and sits down…but what happened next was a “blink and you miss it” moment that led to rampant online speculation.
As Styles is sitting down, his mouth seems to make an odd motion. At the exact moment, Chris Pine had been clapping but suddenly paused to look down at his pants in seeming disgust. Meanwhile, Olivia Wilde offers no response to what is going on except a blank face and a single blink.
Putting the pieces together, online fans began to debate something that previously seemed unthinkable. Did we all just watch Harry Styles spit on Chris Pine in front of the world? Clearly, a closer look at the footage is warranted.
A closer look at the footage
It’s one thing for fans to analyze the footage. Unfortunately, all of the attempts to zoom in and slow down the footage didn’t yield any conclusive results. It wasn’t too long, though, before experts began weighing in.
One such expert is Aric Toler, who is the lead researcher for the Bellingcat investigative group. As Vice reports, Toler weighed in with his thoughts on this crazy incident. “With a Zapruder film-style reconstruction it’s kinda hard to say ‘oh obviously no spit’ because it’s pretty zoomed in, and hey maybe it’s little bits of spittle that didn’t get caught with the lighting/angle,” he said.
Continuing, Toller reached a tentative conclusion. “But him having his lips pursed back like that makes it pretty obvious that he wasn’t hocking a loogie or really doing something that would elicit an incredulous reaction like that.”
So, maybe Styles didn’t spit on Pine. But we’re left to wonder why Pine had such an odd reaction to Styles sitting down. Then again, the internet had a field day laughing at all of the crazy faces Pine made during the event, so maybe this is just one more wacky face.
The official response
The online furor over this alleged incident got so bad that Chris Pine had to officially speak up about the matter.
As Variety reports, Pine’s representative officially denied this incident in the most strident terms. “This is a ridiculous story — a complete fabrication and the result of an odd online illusion that is clearly deceiving and allows for foolish speculation,” the rep said. “Just to be clear, Harry Styles did not spit on Chris Pine. There is nothing but respect between these two men and any suggestion otherwise is a blatant attempt to create drama that simply does not exist.”
All’s well that ends well, right? The alleged victim of the alleged incident is denying the entire thing. And it might have ended here if Harry Styles hadn’t chosen the worst possible time to bring it back up.
Harry Styles makes things worse
Via his representative, Chris Pine denied the spitting incident ever happened on September 6. Two days later, though, Harry Styles was performing at a concert in New York. As The Cut reports, he took this opportunity to engage in what we hope was a joke. He described his trip to the film festival premiere of Don’t Worry Darling by saying he “just popped very quickly to Venice to spit on Chris Pine.”
If you have a dry enough or dark enough sense of humor, the joke (?) is pretty funny. But enough people considered this a tongue-in-cheek admission of guilt that Styles basically brought the controversy back to life even as it was starting to die down.
One drama among many
All things considered, we’re pretty sure that Harry Styles didn’t actually spit on Chris Pine. However, the whole thing might have seemed less plausible if this wasn’t a cursed production full of different issues and dramas.
For example, there have been persistent rumors that director Olivia Wilde and star Florence Pugh had some kind of falling out. Some thought this was why the two seemed to be avoiding each other in Venice, and Pugh declined to appear at the press conference, instead taking the time to grab a spritzer and just generally look iconic for the cameras.
Another Wilde-related bit of drama is that she previously claimed that she had fired Shia LaBeouf from the production due to issues with his acting. LaBeouf claimed he left the production of his own free will, and as Rolling Stone reports, he responded by releasing a video Wilde had sent him begging him to stay. The video also implies Shia had some LeBeef with Florence Pugh since Wilde says “I think this might be a bit of a wake-up call for Miss Flo.”
Long story short? The clip and derogatory “Miss Flo” nickname add fuel to the fire that Wilde had some issues with Florence Pugh. And despite literal video evidence that Wilde wanted LaBeouf to stay, she is still maintaining that she fired him. And considering that LaBeouf is being sued for battery and sexual battery by former girlfriend FKA Twigs, many consider this video evidence that Wilde was willing to go to great lengths to make Pugh work with an abuser.
Unless this movie ends up being far better than all of its promos and trailers have shown, our collective effort at decoding “Spitgate” may well be the most interesting thing about it!