Arrow Star Stephen Amell Blasts "Totally Fabricated" Justice League Headlines

Arrow

star Stephen Amell took to Facebook today to correct what he describes as "totally fabricated" stories about his having had discussions at a studio level with Warner Bros. about playing Green Arrow in future installments of the Man of Steel/Justice League franchise. Starting with "Something I need to get off of my chest," Amell launched into a critique of reporters who cherry-pick a quote and blow it out of proportion to generate web traffic, suggesting that's what happened with stories like the one ComicBook.com ran earlier today. "When I do press, I try and be open, honest and thoughtful. That being said... I find it incredibly discouraging to see a headline like the ones I've been seeing this morning. Headlines that aren't just a stretch, they're totally fabricated. At no point, have I had 'studio level' discussions about any feature films at Warner Bros.," Amell said. "In this particular instance, when I read articles that take a pretty straightforward answer and slap a title on it that has little to no correlation to what I've actually said, it makes it seem as though I'm disrespecting my current position. Which is bulls--t. And why would I do that? I mean... I'm not the smartest dude in the world. (After all... I picked a career in acting.) But would I really just casually subvert a process cloaked in secrecy? A process - by the way - being run by the company who currently employs me. C'MON! "We're making a kick ass show. We will continue to make a kick ass show. And I will continue to interact and provide interesting content for our fans. Because I love our fans. If every once and a while, some dickweed wants to pull a headline out of thin air to generate page views, then that's the price we pay." Interestingly, it wasn't any of the numerous sites that picked up the "studio-level talks" as a headline who seem to be the ones responsible for misrepresenting the quote, but the original Fandango article. Here's the bit that got everyone worked up, with our emphasis added:

Arrow star Steven Amell continues to believe incorporating his TV iteration of Oliver Queen/Green Arrow into any planned big-screen Justice League film is worth doing. "All we have to do for something like that to happen, or even be a possibility, is continue to take care of business with our show and then we put ourselves in a position – but the important thing is our show," he says, revealing that there definitely have been talks at a studio level. "I have had discussions, but I think the gestation process for this project is a lot slower than most people think. I mean, they haven't even shot the next one. They haven't even shot a frame of the movie before the movie everyone thinks is the Justice League movie!"

The underlined portion of the paragraph seems to be where the trouble started, with the reporter who by all appearances was the one to talk to Amell expressing that Amell has revealed "talks at a studio level" and doing so outside of quotation marks but within Amell's direct quote. It's not surprising, then, that other reporters picked it up. Paraphrasing confusing or poorly-worded quotes to get the information across without complicating stories for the reader is a fairly common practice. The fact that this line existed outside of quotation marks probably called for a confirmation or clarification before running with it as a headline--but the "fabrication" in question, intentional or not, appears to have come from the interview rather than any secondary sources.