Louis CK brought his new film I Love You, Daddy to the Toronto International Film Festival over the weekend, revealing for the first time what the film is actually about. (I Love You, Daddy was filmed with zero fanfare, and only announced to the public when it was added to the TIFF schedule last month.) Turns out it’s about a wealthy TV producer (CK) whose spoiled 17-year-old daughter (Chloe Grace Moretz) gets sucked into the orbit of an aging arthouse film director (John Malkovich) who’s been accused of rape and pedophilia. According to Slate’s Sam Adams, although it’s not explicitly stated, the movie is pretty clearly riffing on Woody Allen and the allegations that have followed him for all these years, so much so that CK joked about it in his intro.
Adding another icky wrinkle to the situation are the sexual misconduct allegations that have followed CK himself for several years now, allegations which have gained new resonance in recent weeks thanks to comedian Tig Notaro’s highly public call to “handle” them. As he has in the past, CK refuses to discuss the allegations in an interview that ran in today’s New York Times:
“I’m not going to answer to that stuff, because they’re rumors,” Louis C.K. said during the Toronto interview, as he told Vulture last year. But he added on Sunday, “If you actually participate in a rumor, you make it bigger and you make it real.”
So it’s not real? “No.” he responded. “They’re rumors, that’s all that is.”
And what did he make of the comments by Ms. Notaro, whose work he has championed? (Louis C.K. is an executive producer of her Amazon series, “One Mississippi,” though she has said they haven’t spoken in over a year; a new episode of her series features a plot with echoes of the rumors about Louis C.K.) “I don’t know why she said the things she’s said, I really don’t,” he replied, adding, “I don’t think talking about that stuff in the press and having conversations over press lanes is a good idea.”
Dodging an incriminating question, or refusing to give credence to rumors? For the foreseeable future, that question will probably continue to go unanswered. CK’s career doesn’t seem to be suffering, as I Love You, Daddy, which CK financed himself with profits from his web series Horace And Pete, sold to distributor The Orchard after its TIFF screening for $5 million.