Earlier this month, we learned some unfortunate news about Hollywood super-producer Brian Grazer. Grazer, a longtime Democrat and Democratic Party donor, outed himself as a Donald Trump supporter and Trump voter. Grazer participated in some kind of Fox documentary about Der Führer, and Grazer said (on the record!) that he voted for Trump in 2024 and that several women in his life “canceled” him because of it. Well, Puck News recently pointed out that Grazer’s political turnaround is likely about his bottom line – as in, he’s trying to cozy up to Jeff Bezos and Amazon Prime.

Many industry veterans were gobsmacked when Brian Grazer, the well-known Democratic donor and longtime partner of Ron Howard in Imagine Entertainment, revealed in a Fox Nation documentary (of all places) that he had voted for Donald Trump in the 2024 election. Grazer made that announcement while being filmed in a V.I.P. box with Trump during last December’s Army-Navy football game. He added that he felt like he was getting “canceled” when he told some women he knew about his vote.

Sources have told me the news that Grazer had, um, flipped came as a blow to Howard, as well as many others, including Tom Hanks, whose professional relationship with the duo dates back to Splash in 1984 and continued through three Da Vinci Code movies. Yes, obviously Grazer and Howard made 2020’s Hillbilly Elegy, based on the memoir by J.D. Vance, but both men have long been known as staunch Democrats.

When The New York Times reached Grazer, his explanation hardly helped: “As a centrist, it was because I could feel and see Biden’s deterioration and the lack of direction in the Democratic Party at that time.” A centrist? This did nothing to soothe Grazer’s colleagues. “When this thing happened, they were beside themselves,” a well-placed source told me. Executives at the company “were getting calls from around town—they’re all mortified.”

A high-level source at another company, who has known Grazer for years, was among the aghast. “It is amazing to me that Brian Grazer would go to that football game and never have it pass through his head that [his comments] would be problematic for his partner and people in business with him,” this person said. And then there was the timing—the revelation of Grazer’s vote came as Trump was ordering a military occupation of Los Angeles. This exec added, “I would like to ask Brian if he got what he wanted.” A veteran producer was also shaking his head at Grazer’s public embrace of Trump. “Why would anybody do that in this town, when every major celebrity campaigned for Harris?” he asked.

When it comes to the Town, people tend to “stay in [Grazer’s] world until they get fired or lose their job or he finds a bigger fish,” said a source who has worked with Grazer for years. One very big fish is the world’s third-richest man. Grazer and his fourth wife, Veronica, have become hanging-out-on-the-yacht close with Jeff Bezos and fiancée Lauren Sánchez—so much so that Veronica appeared in the May issue of Vogue as one of 11 women who joined Sánchez on her bachelorette trip to Paris. (Katy Perry, Eva Longoria, Kris Jenner, and Kim Kardashian were also invited.) A producer who has known Grazer for decades said, “I’m sure Brian wasn’t a Republican until it became convenient. He was obviously a Democrat B.B.—before Bezos.”

[From Puck]

The rest of Puck’s piece was just analysis of how Imagine (Grazer and Howard’s production company) is kind of struggling these days and Grazer clearly wants to fish around Jeff Bezos’ deep pockets for some kind of deal. Which makes sense… up to a point. I still have significant questions about exactly what Jeff Bezos is doing (in general) with his obvious political meddling, and I doubt that Bezos is any kind of true-blue MAGAt who would give favorable terms to a Democratic turncoat. I feel like this explanation sort of gives a pass to Brian Grazer as well – even if you argue that he’s done this for business reasons, why did anyone think that their economic standing would improve in any way under Trump? That’s what I keep coming back to with Bezos, Elon Musk, and all of these billionaire-backers – everyone knew that Trump was going to tank the economy, and he’s doing just that. That affects everyone’s bottom line.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.