Elizabeth Banks apologizes for comments about Steven Spielberg

Credit: Frazer Harrison

Credit: Frazer Harrison

Actress Elizabeth Banks is sorry. Very sorry.

Those were the words Banks used in an apologetic tweet Thursday directed at director Steven Spielberg, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

Tuesday night during the Women in Film’s Crystal + Lucy Awards, Banks said Spielberg had never directed a film featuring a female in the lead role. Banks was making her acceptance speech for winning the Crystal Award for Excellence in Film.

“I went to ‘Indiana Jones’ and ‘Jaws' and every movie Steven Spielberg ever made and, by the way, he’s never made a movie with a female lead,” Banks said.

The attack by Banks, who was directed by Spielberg in the 2002 film "Catch Me If You Can,” drew an immediate reaction, with one guest yelling out “The Color Purple,” the 1985 film directed by Spielberg and starring Whoopi Goldberg in the lead role.

“I framed my comments inaccurately,” Banks posted on Twitter. “I want to be clear from the start that I take full responsibility for what I said and I’m sorry.”

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