played another of his melancholy characters, a travel
writer who slowly recovers from the death of his son
and the breakup of his marriage to Turner by falling
for an eccentric dog trainer played by Geena Davis,
who received an Academy Award for her perfor-
mance.
Impact Hurt quickly established himself as one of
the decade’s most popular leading men. Playing a se-
ries of confused, emotionally wounded characters
with an understated Method approach earned him
critical acclaim and box-office success.
Further Reading
Karger, Dave. “A World of Hurt.”Entertainment Weekly,
no. 865 (February 24, 2006): 26.
Linfield, Susan. “Zen and the Art of Film Acting.”
American Film11, no. 6 (July/August, 1986): 28-33.
Millea, Holly. “The Star Who Walked Away.”Premiere
11 (October, 1997): 120-130, 141.
Michael Adams
See also Academy Awards;Big Chill, The; Close,
Glenn; Film in the United States;Kiss of the Spider
Woman; Turner, Kathleen; Weaver, Sigourney.
Hustler Magazine v. Falwell.
Identification U.S. Supreme Court decision
Date Decided on February 24, 1988
The Supreme Court ruled that the First Amendment’s free
speech clause prevented Jerr y Falwell, a prominent preacher
and television personality, from successfully suingHustler
magazine for libel and intentional infliction of emotional
distress for publishing a parody that portrayed Falwell as
having engaged in sexual intercourse with his mother in an
outhouse.
The U.S. Supreme Court has interpreted the free
speech clause of the First Amendment to restrict the
ability of public figures to sue for libel without dem-
onstrating that the person sued had willfully made
false statements of fact about the public figure. In
Hustler Magazine v. Falwell, the Court concluded that
the parody published byHustlermagazine could not
be reasonably construed as making a statement of
fact about Jerry Falwell. Since Falwell was a public
figure, his libel claim against the magazine was re-
jected. The remaining issue was whether the consti-
tutional protections of the freedoms of speech and
the press would also apply in cases where a party
claimed that he had suffered intentionally inflicted
emotional distress because of another’s speech.
Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist announced
the Court’s unanimous decision, in which Justice By-
ron White concurred in a separate opinion. Justice
Anthony Kennedy did not participate in the case.
Chief Justice Rehnquist concluded for the Court
that such interests as a state might have in protecting
public figures from intentionally inflicted emotional
distress could not trump the First Amendment’s pro-
tection of free speech. Speech about public figures
could not always be expected to be temperate, and,
so long as it did not constitute false statements of fact
made deliberately or made with reckless disregard
for whether the statements were false, such speech
received the full protection of the First Amendment.
Falwell had argued that although this standard was
appropriate for claims of libel in which the harm suf-
fered by an individual was one to the individual’s
reputation, it ought not to apply to claims that the
speech had inflicted emotional distress upon a vic-
tim. The Court rejected this argument, concluding
that even speech that caused emotional distress to
public officials was protected by the First Amend-
ment, so long as it did not contain deliberately made
false statements of fact.
Impact Jerry Falwell, a prominent Baptist minister
and television personality, achieved prominence dur-
ing the 1980’s for his leadership of the Moral Major-
ity, a conservative political action group. However
outrageousHustler’s parody may have been, though,
Falwell’s position as a public figure meant that free-
dom of speech would protect even this speech from
liability. As a parody, the magazine’s article could
not reasonably be interpreted as a statement of fact,
whether false or not. Though Falwell included not
only a libel claim, but one asserting intentionally in-
flicted emotional damage, the Court, with essentially
one voice, ruled that the First Amendment prevented
his recovery. The victory of Larry Flynt in this case
leant credence to his claim to be a crusader for civil
liberties rather than merely a pornographer, and it
helped establish that even pornographic magazines
could function as legitimate organs of cultural com-
mentary deserving of First Amendment protections.
Further Reading
Russomanno, Joseph.Speaking Our Minds: Conversa-
tions with the People Behind Landmark First Amend-498 Hustler Magazine v. Falwell The Eighties in America