In case you might not remember all the way back to Oscars ’03, but here is a column to refresh your memory:
“EXTREMELY VULGAR.” Harvey is once more up to his elbows in controversy. This time, it’s for putting Miramax muscle behind an opinion piece written by Oscar-winning director Robert Wise. In the piece, Wise — a former Academy president — strongly pushes Martin Scorsese, director of Miramax’s The Gangs of New York, for the Best Director award. Wise’s commentary appeared in the Los Angeles Daily News and The Long Beach Press-Telegram, and then was republished as an ad by Miramax that was placed in the trades.
Since Mar. 14, it has been the talk of Hollywood. Oscar-winning director Barry Levinson told the LA Times the piece was “extremely vulgar,” while Academy President Frank Pierson called it an “outright violation of Academy rules.”
And here is video of Harvey Weinstein as one of the producers on Gangs of New York attending the ceremony.
But a commenter reminds us that:
Much as I hate to defend the Academy, the current rules were adopted in response to the 2003 incident. Pierson learned, much to his chagrin, that the Academy only had campaign ‘guidelines’ and had no basis or provision to sanction people for violating them. In the summer of that year they had a meeting in which they adopted formal rules, and established a procedure for imposing penalties on violators.
Well that explains it.  It still seems overly harsh to me.