Boston Phoenix film critic Peter Keough, a former Chicagoan and one-time writer for the Reader, isn’t exactly a national celebrity.
But he has been at the center of a tiny tempest for the last few days, invited to this week’s media confab in Chicago to publicize the movie “Road to Perdition,” starring Tom Hanks, Paul Newman and Jennifer Jason Leigh.
Actually, he was invited, briefly disinvited and then reinvited.
Dreamworks Inc. informed the Phoenix (an alternative weekly) last week that its writer wasn’t welcome, as a protest over the paper’s publication of images and link to a video of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl’s execution. The paper’s editor, Peter Kadzis, acknowledged the decision Thursday but declined to comment.
But Friday, Dreamworks reinvited the Phoenix. “We wanted to express our concern that their handling of the Pearl matter was inappropriate,” a Dreamworks spokesman said. “But we shouldn’t have tried to interfere with their editorial effort. We actually meant to protest by means of where our advertising dollars will go.”
Will Keough attend the party, which includes a screening of the film at the Chicago Theatre on Tuesday (not open to the public) and hotel interviews with many of the stars Wednesday and Thursday? Kadzis said Friday he hadn’t heard of the reversal.
Keough, whose work has appeared in the Tribune, said only that he was “bewildered by it all and sorry, because I was looking forward to coming back.”
