Julian Assange demanded $1 million for WikiLeaks documentary interview

[Cali_Democrat]

Steve Rose
The Guardian, Tuesday 9 July 2013 14.00 EDT

Had things worked out differently, Alex Gibney and Julian Assange could have been soulmates – instead, they've ended up more as enemies. Gibney is one of the most prolific documentary-makers of today, and his films often take the perspective of the victim or antihero. As such, Assange was hard to resist. "Here's this tremendously romantic figure travelling the world with a laptop in his knapsack, exposing abuses of power," says Gibney. "That sounds like a pretty good story to me."

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But Gibney's documentary We Steal Secrets: the Story of WikiLeaks is first out of the gate – though the central subject is conspicuous by his absence. That's part of the reason their relationship soured, explains Gibney. The director was in talks with Assange for almost a year. Initially, they got on. Jemima Khan (one of We Steal Secrets' producers) introduced them – Gibney even attended Assange's 40th birthday party in Norfolk, along with Vivienne Westwood and Bianca Jagger, not to mention his rivals Ferguson and Poitras. "Charles got in trouble because he kept sneaking out his camera," Gibney says with a laugh. "Laura always had access to Julian. And now she's got Snowden" – as in Edward, whose own whistleblowing saga is the next must-have subject. Poitras filmed Snowden's Hong Kong interview for the Guardian in June.

But negotiations broke down when Assange told Gibney the going rate for an interview was $1m. Gibney said he never paid his subjects. He goes on: "[Assange] then came up with an outrageous idea: 'How about you spy on the other interview subjects and report back to me, because I want to know what they're saying.' I said, 'No. I can't do that for you. I don't work for you.' [Assange] said in a huff, 'I don't work for you, either.'"

Good stuff. Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2013/jul/09/wikileaks-documentary-julian-assange-1m

[MineralMan]

1. Of course he did. nt