Four months ago, Alec Baldwin shot a woman dead.
There’s no doubt about what happened, no ambiguity.
The actor was the one holding the gun that discharged live ammunition that killed film cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, 42, and also wounded director Joel Souza.
Of course, nobody believes Baldwin did this on purpose.
It was clearly a terrible, horrendous accident, and the result of appalling safety protocol failures on the set of his Western movie, “Rust.”
But he still did it.
The gun was in his hand when it fired a deadly bullet into his co-worker’s body and snuffed out her life.
Nobody else’s hands were anywhere near the gun.
Therefore, regardless of what went on before it went off, Baldwin was ultimately responsible for Hutchins’ death.
Yet ever since that dreadful day, he has been engaged in a woefully self-pitying PR tour cynically designed to make people think HE was just as much a victim as the woman he killed.
He’s repeatedly spewed his indignant denials of any responsibility to his millions of followers on social media, and in television interviews.
The crux of his defense lies in what he told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos: “I feel that someone is responsible for what happened, and I can’t say who that is, but I know it’s not me.”
To which Hutchins’ widower, Matt, who has launched a wrongful death lawsuit against Baldwin and two dozen other defendants, retorted: “The idea that the person holding the gun causing it to discharge is not responsible, is absurd to me.”
Yes, to me too.
And, I suspect, to everyone with even half a brain who isn’t named Alec Baldwin.
Yet he resolutely refuses to accept this self-evident fact, blaming anyone and everyone but himself.
In yet another self-protective performance on stage at the Boulder International Film Festival this weekend, he even had the incredible gall to attack those like Matt Hutchins who are seeking legal redress for what happened, suggesting they’re only suing people like him because he’s rich.
“What you have is a certain group of litigants on whatever side,” he said, “who their attitude is, ‘Well, the people who likely seem negligent have enough money. And the people who have money are not negligent, but we’re not gonna let that stop us from doing what we need to do in terms of litigation.’ Why sue people if you’re not going to get money? That’s what you’re doing.”
What a disgustingly insensitive, arrogant, dismissive, soulless way to behave towards a man whose wife is dead because of Baldwin’s actions.
This latest outburst will do nothing to calm Matt Hutchins’ fury that was ignited by watching Baldwin’s sniveling and cowardly lack of self-accountability on ABC.
In an emotion-charged appearance on the “Today” program afterward, he raged: “I was just so angry to see him talk about her death so publicly, in such a detailed way and then to not accept any responsibility after having just described killing her.”
I would be, too.
Wouldn’t we all in his position?
And that anger will surely have been exacerbated by the endless stream of self-indulgent crap that both Baldwin and his equally narcissistic and enabling wife, Hilaria, have pumped out on social media since the shooting to try to persuade the public of his total innocence and victimhood status.
They’ve filmed and shared themselves smirking and laughing, kissing and cuddling on date nights, playing happy family with their six children, and praising each other’s strength and courage.
It’s all been nauseatingly tone-deaf and shockingly disrespectful toward the grieving Hutchins family.
Yet it’s entirely predictable conduct by a couple who, when they’re not waging constant vicious verbal and sometimes physical war with the media, wallow in a relentless orgy of cringe-making media self-promotion.
In his film festival appearance on Saturday, Baldwin even took a call from Hilaria during his interview on stage, roaring with laughter as he showed her on his phone to the audience, and she revealed she was doing a cat puzzle.
Pass the bloody barf bucket.
Their collective lack of self-awareness so soon after the devastating events of just a few months ago defies logic or understanding unless you see the bigger picture, which isn’t lost on Matt Hutchins.
“Almost sounds like he was the victim,” he said of Baldwin’s whining to ABC. “And hearing him blame Halyna in the interview and shift responsibility to others and seeing him cry about it, I just feel like, ‘Are we really supposed to feel bad about you, Mr. Baldwin?’”
Yes, that’s exactly what he wants us to feel, because Alec Baldwin’s a shameful, selfish slimeball who is determined not to be held to even a scintilla of accountability for shooting a woman, either in a criminal or civil legal action.
On the day her widower announced his lawsuit, Baldwin posted a cryptic message, saying: “In Buddhism, being truthful goes beyond simply not telling lies. It means speaking truthfully and honestly, yes. But it also means using speech to benefit others, and not to use it to benefit only ourselves.”
Oh please.
Aside from the eye-popping hypocrisy of a man who denies killing someone he killed preaching about honesty, he also seems to have forgotten that one of Buddhism’s five main tenets is to abstain from taking the lives of other living beings.
Alec Baldwin can deny it all he wants, but he killed Halyna Hutchins.
Not deliberately, but he killed her.
And no amount of desperate Hollywood career-saving spin can change that simple fact.
So he should shut up with his deluded, self-serving bulls–t that’s causing so much added pain to the family of his victim.
The only talking I now want to hear from him is in a courtroom.
George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism