Meghan McCain Lashes Out Over Alec Baldwin's ABC Interview
In the months since the devastating accidental shooting and subsequent death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, 42, on the set of the forthcoming Western film "Rust" in October, public opinion of Alec Baldwin — who was handling the gun at the time of the shooting — has waxed and waned. In a recent interview with ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos, Baldwin reflected on the experience and how he has been coping since the accident. Despite his tearful performance, not everyone was won over. Writing for Daily Mail, Meghan McCain lashed out over the interview, which she described as "tonally distasteful and a bit confusing."
The ABC interview was the first time Baldwin discussed the shooting with the media. Immediately following the fateful day, he shared a statement to Twitter expressing his "shock and sadness" over what occurred on set (via The Guardian). "I'm fully cooperating with the police investigation to address how this tragedy occurred and I am in touch with her husband, offering my support to him and his family," he tweeted. "My heart is broken for her husband, their son, and all who knew and loved Halyna."
He has remained fairly quiet about the incident since then, until sitting down with Stephanopoulos. Throughout the interview, he appeared to struggle to maintain his composure as he discussed the death of Hutchins. In the interview he says that it "doesn't feel real," but that he doesn't feel guilty about the death because he didn't "pull the trigger," per CNN.
Meghan McCain reacts to Alec Baldwin's interview
Suffice it to say, Alec Baldwin's ABC interview didn't go so over well. Meghan McCain in particular had a lot to say about it and shared her thoughts via an impassioned Daily Mail article. McCain compared her own feelings about the interview's trailer to those of CNN journalist Andrew Kaczynski. Following the trailer's release, Kaczynski tweeted, "I find something unseemly about this big promo/hoopla with graphics and dramatic sounds to talk about a woman's tragic death." McCain echoed these sentiments in her article, describing the trailer as "more like a teaser for an upcoming fictional television show than of a famous actor's first sitdown amid a still-pending investigation into the tragic death of an innocent woman."
After watching the full interview, her opinion remained the same. McCain touched on Baldwin and George Stephanopoulos' arguably limited knowledge of guns, then said that watching the interview made her "uncomfortable." "A woman lost her life a little over a month ago, and there is still an active investigation into how and why this could possibly happen and Halyna Hutchins' family is still grieving," McCain wrote. "I would say ABC should know better and do better, but that would have had to have started with Alec understanding respectful boundaries, something we all know he has never been good at." Talk about a mic drop.
It is unclear what Baldwin hoped to accomplish with his ABC interview, but odds are this wasn't it.