AND THE WINNER IS . . . UH, NOT SO FAST, PASHA
Pasha Grishuk, two-time ice dance gold medalist and aspiring Oscar winner, may have scuttled her acting career before it started.
After being turned down for a role as a figure skater in John Frankenheimer’s new spy movie, “Ronin,” because the film schedule conflicted with the Olympics, Grishuk made disparaging remarks about her replacement, Katarina Witt--dryly assessing the choice of Witt as boring.
In a letter to the International Herald Tribune on Wednesday, Frankenheimer returned fire, writing:
“In spite of the fact that she is a brilliant skater, Pasha Grishuk was way out of line when she made a derogatory comment about one of the stars of my film, Katarina Witt.
“Miss Witt is not only a magnificent skater, but she brought a lovely quality of vulnerability and beauty to the role, which I do not feel Miss Grishuk ever could have done.
“The luckiest thing that has happened to me in the filming of ‘Ronin’ was that Miss Grishuk was unavailable because of the Olympics and we were fortunate enough to get another two-time Olympic champion, Katarina Witt.
“I deeply resent artists in any field saying derogatory things about their colleagues. Miss Grishuk should just take her two medals and retreat silently into the wings.”
Updated scorecard on Grishuk’s nascent acting career: Hollywood 1, Pasha 0.
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