Harvey Weinstein

Harvey Weinstein (born March 19, 1952) is an American former film producer and convicted sex offender who rose to prominence as co-founder of Miramax Films, a studio that specialized in independent cinema and achieved substantial commercial and critical success. With his brother Bob Weinstein, he established Miramax in 1979, later selling it to the Walt Disney Company in 1993 while retaining operational control until 2005, during which the company distributed influential films including Pulp Fiction (1994) and produced Academy Award winners such as The English Patient (1996) and Shakespeare in Love (1998), the latter earning Weinstein a Best Picture Oscar. After departing Miramax, he co-founded The Weinstein Company in 2005, which continued producing notable films but filed for bankruptcy in 2018 following revelations of widespread sexual misconduct allegations against him. These allegations culminated in criminal convictions: in New York, a 2020 jury found him guilty of rape in the third degree and a criminal sexual act, leading to a 23-year sentence that was overturned on appeal in April 2024 due to procedural errors; a retrial in 2025 resulted in a June conviction for criminal sexual assault (carrying up to 25 years), alongside a mistrial on a rape charge, with the conviction upheld in January 2026 after a judge rejected a bid for a new trial based on juror complaints about decorum during deliberations, and Weinstein considering a guilty plea to the third-degree rape charge involving actress Jessica Mann to avoid a third trial. In California, a separate 2022 conviction for forcible rape, forcible oral copulation, and sexual battery imposed a 16-year sentence, which he is currently serving concurrently. His cases have been cited as catalysts for the #MeToo movement, though defenses have highlighted evidentiary issues and noted that not all accusations proceeded to conviction.

Harvey Weinstein was born on March 19, 1952, in the Flushing neighborhood of Queens, New York City, into an Ashkenazi Jewish family. His father, Max Weinstein (1924–1976), worked as a diamond cutter, a skilled trade that provided a modest but stable income for the household, and Max fostered his sons' early interest in cinema by taking them to movies and discussing films at home. His mother, Miriam Weinstein (née Postel; 1926–2016), served as a homemaker and was described by family members as the supportive backbone of the home.