Brave

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HQ, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2018

Copyright © Rose McGowan 2018

Rose McGowan asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

Some names have been changed in this book to protect people’s privacy.

Cover design © HarperCollins

Cover image © Josef Jasso

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Ebook Edition © January 2018 ISBN: 9780008291105

PRAISE FOR BRAVE

‘Brave is a blisteringly raw, angry and graphic account of a life marred by growing up in a cult, abuse and tragedy . . . there are few who have dared to be as brutally honest and angry about their treatment by the Hollywood machine as McGowan.’

i News

‘Her memoir is an unapologetically furious read. Sweary, raw and unrefined, Brave is female rage as it is rarely allowed to be seen.’

The Pool

‘Sensationally explosive . . . A battle cry you want to get behind.’

The Sunday Times Culture

‘This memoir is more than just Brave, it’s a game-changing, tooth bared roar of defiance’

’The Mail on Sunday

‘McGowan set out to write a book that examines abuse, and she has done just that.’

The Guardian

‘Rose McGowan’s courage is palpable in an exposé that condemns Hollywood misogyny and the “monster”.’

The Observer

DEDICATION

Dedicated to all of us survivors

CONTENTS

1  COVER

2  TITLE PAGE

3  COPYRIGHT

4  PRAISE FOR BRAVE

5  DEDICATION

6  CONTENTS

7  AUTHOR’S NOTE

8  PREFACE

9  INTRODUCTION

10  PART ONE CHILD OF GOD AMERICAN GIRL RUNAWAY THINKER BRUTALITY CAPTIVITY IT BEGINS DEATH OF SELF CIRCUS LIFE TELEVISED LIFE DESTRUCTION

11  PART TWO ASHES TO ASHES PHOENIX RISE CULT OF THOUGHT WE ARE BRAVE

12  P. S.

13  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

14  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

15  CREDITS

16  ABOUT THE PUBLISHER

GuideCoverContentsChapter 1

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AUTHOR’S NOTE

2018. The Year of the Trigger. What a beast she was, what a beauty she was, too.

Beast because of the ugly truths that came to light. Beauty because we pressed reset on our value system.

My book, BRAVE, is not about #MeToo. It’s the backstory that led up to a cultural shift of tectonic magnitude. It is the story of an extreme life – mine – containing strong views – also mine. It is the story of an outsider-cum-activist. If you go on this journey with me then, through BRAVE, I promise you will think and see a bit differently by the end of it.

I have not been formed like most. It means I have kind of the ultimate outsider’s point of view. This is not a positive nor is it a negative, it is just a fact. You see, I’ve lived my life in cults and with cult leaders, with only small periods of my life lived in traditional society. They do say you’re more vulnerable to falling into another cult if you are born into one, and maybe that’s the explanation. Because the only real difference between Hollywood and a religious sect, is the evening gowns and the money. They both worship false idols. They are both cults.

I would know, I was in both. This is that story.

My life has always been one of extremes. Writing this book proved to be no different. While writing BRAVE, I endured being hacked, stalked, spied on, had parts of this manuscript stolen. My life was infiltrated by Israeli spies and harassing lawyers, some of the most formidable on earth. These evil people hounded me at every turn while I went about resurrecting the ghosts that have made up my time on earth. I can only say it was extraordinarily stressful, an incredible high-wire act that required great strategy. There was never any other choice. Justice would be served.

And it was. I am immeasurably proud of having a hand in this cataclysmic global reckoning and the felling of monsters. I truly believe that a win for one of us is a win for all of us.

A few years ago, I realized society needed to be primed to hear The Story, so I set about taking my voice of dissent public. I decided to openly fight the machine, the manufacturers of myth, the gaslighters themselves, the sacred men of Hollywood. For far too long they’d been on top and able to get away with criminal behavior. I wanted to make it impossible to look away. And then the US election happened, making sexism far harder to deny; it paved the way for obvious truth to be revealed to those who’d for so long turned a blind eye.

In early 2017, I’d been working on BRAVE for a few years when I made contact with two investigative reporters. It was time. The story took many twists and turns as it all unfolded, and I’m proud to have had a hand in starting the worldwide conversation.

Since I and so many brave survivors have come forward, titans of every industry have toppled. We survivors have gained our power. We survivors are using our voices in record numbers. We cannot let up, and as hard as it is, we must continue to get even louder, to push even harder. We all count. We all matter.

Here’s to freedom, yours and mine.

Now go breathe fire.

RM, 2019

PREFACE

“Did you break up with someone?”

At first the question made me angry. I thought it sexist, stereotypical, disheartening. There was no death of a relationship that made me so in need of freedom that I’d alter myself. The more the breakup question was asked, the more it made me think about my motives. I realized I had broken up with someone. I broke up with you. The collective you, the societal you. I broke up with the Hollywood ideal, the one that I had a part in playing. The ideal version of “woman” that is sold to you by every actress in every hair commercial telling you, “This is the secret to being beguiling, the secret to getting a man to want you.” Long, glossy Kardashian-esque hair that says, “Fuck me, big boy.” As if that’s all we are and all we can be. Hair. Hair is what I broke up with. And it was a breakup that was years in the making; it took a lot to wake me from my brainwashed slumber. My long hair had always made me uncomfortable. It made men look at me while the real me disappeared. I would use it to cover my face, to check out, to sleep. And sleep I did. The real Rose slept while the fake Rose lived a bizarre alternate life playing the part of someone who played parts.

Most of my life I had short hair. I preferred it that way. The classic film stars and punk women I most admired had short hair. I liked very much being an individual. I liked looking neither female nor male, but hovering somewhere in between. The two periods of time when I had long hair were the hardest in my life, the times I was most lost from myself—my teen years when I suffered from a raging eating disorder and later when I suffered from a mental disorder called Hollywood. The Hollywood disorder lasted a much longer time, but both had to do with being absent from self. Both times were driven by society’s number one propaganda machine—Hollywood. I was told I had to have long hair, otherwise the men doing the hiring in Hollywood wouldn’t want to fuck me, and if they didn’t want to fuck me, they wouldn’t hire me. I was told this by my female agent, which is tragic on many levels. So, so evil and so, so sad. Evil because I took the information from an older woman who was the mouthpiece for what Hollywood wants. Sad because she was right. This message gets filtered down to all women and girls, telling us to have long hair so we too can be sexy, but I got the direct message, like a hotline phone call straight from what “the man” wants.

Well, fuck Hollywood. Fuck the messaging. Fuck the propaganda. Fuck the stereotypes.

If you’re a Jennifer Lawrence, America’s sweetheart type, you have simple blond hair. If you’re the vixen, it is long, dark, and big. Those are the rules, do not deviate. My long hair was beautiful, like beauty pageant contestant hair. My hairdressers were gay males and I was their Barbie come to life; at least that’s what they told me. I didn’t think I looked like Barbie. I thought I looked more like a blow-up sex doll, the kind with the hole for the mouth. I had been turned into the ultimate fantasy fuck toy by the Hollywood machine. All the men and women hired to make me look like said fantasy fuck toy did a good job, but I was dying on the inside and embarrassed by what I looked like on the outside. But I didn’t know how to change what was wrong when there were so many levels of wrong in my life.

I meet so many women and girls who tell me their hair is a security blanket and what they hide behind. I find this not only relatable, but heartbreaking. Of course you should have long hair if YOU feel like having long hair, but examine your motives. What part does society play in telling you how you should look? What part does media play in showing you what you should be? And if you are hiding behind your hair, why do you want to live a life in hiding and what are you hiding from?

When I shaved my head, it was a battle cry, but more than that it gave me an answer to the question I so hated.

Did I break up with someone?

Yes, I broke up with the world.

You can, too.

My name is Rose McGowan and I am BRAVE.

INTRODUCTION

There once was a famous actress named Frances Farmer. She hated everything about her artificial life. She wanted to be free. Frances tried to escape fame and the toxicity of Hollywood’s male-dominated world, but the studio had her captured. They took Frances to a mental institution. They locked her up. There was nothing wrong with her mind, she just didn’t want to be famous. She screamed, begging for her life. Instead they took it. They laid her down, restrained her, and shocked her mind with electricity. Shock. Shock. Shock. Over and over. The male powers that be in Hollywood wanted Frances to be a submissive good little girl, and remain so. What they left of her was an empty shell, a husk of a woman. Frances was never Frances again. And all because she didn’t want to be sold as entertainment.

Very few sex symbols escape Hollywood with their minds intact, if they manage to stay alive at all. The streets of Hollywood are paved over the bodies of the vulnerable, the fucked with, the lied to, and the hurt. I know, I was almost one of them. You may think that what happens in Hollywood doesn’t affect you. You’re wrong. My darlings, who do you think is curating your reality? Who is showing you who and what you want to be?

I want to have a frank conversation about an inner sickness that I see few, if any, addressing: how and why Hollywood creates a fucked-up mirror for you to look in. How you are seeing yourself through your own eyes, but perhaps not your own mind. Hollywood affects your life in ways you may not even be aware of.

In my past of being sold as a product, I have been a part of massaging your brain. I wiggled into your mind professionally. I was the cigarette the advertisers told you you needed. I’ve also been on the other side of the looking glass. Watching you. Studying you. Impersonating you. All of us in Hollywood, media, and advertising do. And you know what? We are really good at it. We have had it drilled into us how best to be marketed to you. How best to be sold to you. How to implant what “we” want into your brain, into your thoughts, into your wallet. And it works. You’re sold a fake reality all for the rock-bottom price of $14.

The men who thought they owned me think that they own you. They are the latest in a long line of myth peddlers, from the men behind the Bible to these modern-day “content creators.” They’re mostly self-aggrandizing, egomaniacal abusers of power. And they’ve never been more dangerous. Few in Hollywood, and no actress that I can recall, has gone rogue. Hollywood operates like the Mafia when it comes to protecting its own. Especially if your “own” is a rich white male. Yes, I said it. But here’s the thing, it’s true. I didn’t make it so, it just is. In other news, the sky is blue in Los Angeles today.

By telling some of my story, I aim to shine a light. For those who think Hollywood is a silly joke . . . it’s not. It’s a deadly serious business and one that keeps its winnings. You may think it’s as simple as forking over hard-earned cash for a night out at the movies or paying a cable bill to be entertained. I’m here to tell you the price you are paying is much higher than you know. You are paying with your mind, your behavior, and your patterns. Things that should have no price tag. In our as-seen-on-TV society, the simple fact is that what you have watched and consumed, from birth, has formed you and continues to form you. Even those who’ve opted out of its false reality have to stay vigilant to remain free from the lies and from the messages that do far more harm than they should. Because they are insidious, and they are everywhere.

My life, as you will read, has taken me from one dangerous cult to another, one of the biggest cults of all: Hollywood. I say biggest because short of a nuclear bomb, Hollywood has the farthest reach. BRAVE is the story of how I fought my way out of these cults and reclaimed my life. I want to help you do the same.

You can say “no more.”

You can say “yes” to a freer you.

You can be free of the trap that’s been set for you. And believe me, it has been set.

I am writing this book because I want to have a real conversation with the public and most especially you. I am honored that my words will enter your consciousness and conscience, that my thoughts will rest in your mind. I take that responsibility seriously.

Call what I’m doing a public service and you’d be correct. It is.

Hollywood is a dirty town up to some dirty tricks.

This is not a tell-all.

This is a tell-it-how-it-is.

CHILD OF GOD

Here’s the thing about cults: I see them everywhere.

If you’re deep into the Kardashians, you’re in a cult. If you watch your favorite TV show and go online and you’re in chat rooms with everybody else who’s obsessed with that show and you’re breaking it down episode by episode, you’re in a cult. If you’re bingeing, scrolling, absorbing from one news source more than any other, especially if it happens to be fair and balanced, you are in a cult. You’re living your life through other people. If you blindly vote for so-and-so, you’re in a cult. If you’re deep into your country’s propaganda machine, you’re in a cult. Look around you and see where the cults are, because they are everywhere. Anywhere there is group thought and group mentality: you’re in a cult, you’re in a cult, you’re in a cult.

The first step to deprogramming yourself from a cult is realizing you are in a cult. I would know, I escaped from two of the most iconic cults of all time.

For those who knew me as an actress, I must inform you that I was never that person. I was playing the part of someone who played parts. I was trapped by rigid societal ideals and gender expectations placed on me by people who shouldn’t have been allowed near me (or you). I got such a deeeeeeeeep mind fucking. I rejected brainwashing early on in life, but later, Hollywood’s Cult of Thought actually got me.

My life altered irrevocably the day I turned into a pixel, beamed up to an orbiting satellite and beamed back down, blasted across living rooms, bedrooms, lives. My job was to take you away from your struggles for a while, to make you feel empathy, to make you feel at all. I took my job seriously. But like in most cults, because I was a woman, I was considered to be an owned object. I was sold for the pleasure of the public. Deeply programmed men (and women) made money selling my breasts, my skin, my hair, my emotions, my health, my being. I was not taken seriously, nor was I respected. Not by most of society, and certainly not by the Hollywood cult with its massively industrialized Madonna/Whore complex.

Imagine if your value to the company you work for was measured by how much semen you could extract from anonymous masses of men. ’Cause you know, if strange men masturbate to your movies, you must be of some value. Sounds like a sex worker, right? You’re not too far off.

Imagine that every word to come out of your mouth for nearly seventeen years, day after day, month after month, angle after angle, take after take, was something an all too narrow-minded male wrote for you to say. It’s meta and it’s deeply abnormal.

It took me a long time to figure out that I was in another cult, because I was too busy being other people, not myself. By telling the story of my life, I am reclaiming it.

But let’s start at the beginning, shall we?

In a stone barn, in the tiny Italian countryside town of Certaldo, delivered by a blind midwife, as the story goes, I came into the world. There’s an American saying: “Shut that door! Were you born in a barn?!” I guess I never have to shut doors if I don’t want to. I have that prerogative. I suppose sometimes you’re just earmarked for weirdness from birth, and I think I’m one of those.

The barn was on the property of the duke of Zoagli, known as Duke Emanuele, who, upon joining the Children of God, donated his estate and land to Children of God. His sister Rosa Arianna lived on the property, but loathed all the Children of God members living there. My parents named me after her, Rosa Arianna, I think to make her like them. Didn’t work.

It was incredibly beautiful there in the rolling hills outside Florence, the dark green cypresses and silvery-green olive trees, vineyards, and orchards, those enormous old terra-cotta jars holding red geranium flowers. I suppose if you have to be in a cult, it was as good a place as any.

Nah, it was better, and even at a young age, I saw the beauty and knew it was wildly extraordinary. I connected to its nature as an escape from what I was born into. As a result, I’ve always been drawn to shapes, colors, and light patterns, and the Italian countryside has haunted me my whole life, in a good way.

From my earliest memories I recall hearing a lot about a terrifying old man named “Moses” David Berg, our fearless leader in the Children of God. He would send his directives out in cartoon pamphlets called “Mo Letters.” Whatever Moses David wrote, that’s what was done. Each time there was a new letter it would be as if the ruler of the universe had spoken. (Kind of like the head of a studio in Hollywood.) And I guess as the self-appointed prophet he was, Moses David turned out to be the King of Creeps. But the others didn’t know that yet. Some would never know.

I remember a lot of hairy legs, men’s and women’s, like in the cartoons where you only see the adults’ legs because that’s your perspective as a child. I remember a lot of singing, praying, clapping, and snapping. Yes, snapping. I was told I had to sit on the floor all day and learn how to snap my fingers, otherwise God wouldn’t teach me to drive when I was sixteen. I didn’t understand anything about sixteen and driving, but even then I could tell finger snapping as the key to doing anything was patently absurd.

One night, a ghostly looking woman in a white robe came into the room I was in. She was like a shadow holding a candle—there was no electricity. It was storming outside and I remember the wooden shutter slapping against the old glass window. I had been worried the window was going to break, but I was now distracted by the woman in white who sat by my feet. The wind was whistling through cracks in the stone and I was having trouble hearing her. The wind stopped and she looked straight into me and said, “Have you let God into your heart?”

I sat up, looked at her, considered carefully, and shook my head no.

The woman pinches my foot and twists my skin. I am not going to cry out because I know that’s what she wants. For this refusal there was punishment. Corporal punishment, slaps and spankings, because “spare the rod, spoil the child.” She twists harder. I bite the inside of my lip so I don’t cry. I stare back, silently defiant.

The woman says it again, this time in German, “Hast du Gott in dein Herz gelassen?”

I think about it and say, “No. Not today. Try tomorrow.”

She slaps me across the face. Hard.

Even at that tender age, I reasoned that if I invited him into my heart, it would be their God I was letting inside. It would no longer be my God, whom I was very protective of. And their God was cruel. What they were preaching made no sense to me, their actions not squaring with their words. That was not a reality I wanted to exist in.

Later my younger sister Daisy urged me to just say yes, that it would go easier for me, but I kept taking the punishment instead. I was, as my name foretold, quite thorny, whereas my sister was a little golden-haired, sweet child. I would stare at her and wonder how she got that way and how she couldn’t see what was going on. It was a strange sensation growing up behind these walls and being told I did not belong to the outside world, but I also knew I didn’t belong to the world within.

When that woman or another woman or another man, all strangers, returned the next night and the night after, I always had the same response: “No, no, I have not let God into my heart.”