What You Need to Know About the Grammys Controversy
This week, Deborah Dugan, the former CEO of the Recording Academy, the body that oversees the Grammy Awards, filed a discrimination lawsuit against her former employer days ahead of the annual ceremony. Her 46-page legal complaint included allegations of sexual misconduct, gender discrimination, and corruption in the Academy, casting a shadow of doubt and mistrust on the award system revered as music’s highest honor.
As “music’s biggest night quickly approaches and the clamor (and confusion) surrounding Dugan’s accusations continue, we try to make sense of the ongoing controversy. Here are some of the biggest takeaways from Dugan’s bombshell revelations below.
The "Boys' Club" Nature of the Academy
In her legal filing, Dugan blamed the “boys' club” mentality of executives within the Recording Academy as influential factors that were ultimately reflected in the voting process for annual Grammy nominations. During Dugan’s short time as CEO of the Academy—she joined in August and was removed on January 16—she was adamant about making changes to address public concern that the Grammys were becoming outdated and failed to showcase a more diverse pool of musicians.
The most glaring example of gender inequality at the Grammys was in 2018, when the sole woman to win an award during the telecast was Alessia Cara, who won Best New Artist. The only woman to be nominated for Album of the Year, pop singer Lorde, was not invited to perform her music that evening. Lack of female representation at the Grammys was further confirmed by a 2018 study by the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative, which showed that between 2013 and 2018 alone, only 9.3 percent of the nominees for Record of the Year, Album of the Year, Song of the Year, Best New Artist and Producer of the Year were women.
When asked about the Recording Academy's inadequate recognition of female artists, then-Academy CEO Neil Portnow said women musicians “should step up” in order to win Grammys. The remarks were not received lightly, and Portnow announced months later that he would step down as CEO in 2019.
Influencing Award Winners
Dugan mentions in her claims that memorable artists such as Beyoncé, Kanye West, Mariah Carey, and Frank Ocean were snubbed in previous years, and that the biggest awards tend to go to rock, country, and pop artists. She then outlined how the Grammy voting process is allegedly tainted.
Submissions for awards are first voted on by the members of the Academy, and then the top 20 entries are reviewed by smaller committees to narrow down the list to the final five to eight nominees for each category, Dugan's file explains. But, according to her complaint, the board uses the committees to promote artists they have relationships with, and "manipulates the nominations process" to include songs that Grammys producer Ken Ehrlich wants performed during the ceremony. The board has even given nominations to submissions that weren't in the top 20 list at all, per the filing. This year, that happened with 30 nominees.
When proposals regarding the need for a more inclusive approach to the Grammy Awards were presented—specifically from Tina Tchen, the former chief of staff for Michelle Obama and head of the Grammy Task Force on Diversity and Inclusion—one board member said to Dugan, "this is bullshit," according to the complaint.
When asked if the public should view the Grammys as a rigged awards ceremony during an interview on Good Morning America, Dugan responded, “I’m saying that the system should be transparent and there are instances of conflicts of interest that has tainted the results.”
The Recording Academy denied the rigging accusations in a statement saying, "Spurious allegations claiming members or committees use our process to push forward nominations for artists they have relationships with are categorically false, misleading and wrong. This process is strictly enforced with everyone involved and has no exceptions."
Sexual Harassment Allegations
In her complaint, Dugan also accused the Academy’s entertainment lawyer Joel Katz of inappropriately propositioning her during a work dinner. Katz rejected the allegations in a statement from his lawyer, saying, “Ms. Dugan's allegations of harassment and her description of a dinner at the steakhouse in the Ritz Carlton, Laguna Niguel are false and Mr. Katz categorically and emphatically denies her version of that evening."
“Under the guise of a work dinner, I was propositioned by the general counsel entertainment lawyer—an enormous power in the industry,” Dugan explained during her appearance on GMA and also alleged in her filing. “Starting with calling me 'babe' and telling me how attractive I was and how pretty I was, and then the evening went on to a kiss and him trying to kiss me and all the way through I felt like I was being tested ... I feel that was a power-setting move as soon as I was coming onto the committee.”
Rape Allegations
Dugan alleged that former Recording Academy CEO Neil Portnow—who stepped down in 2019 after being widely criticized for telling women to “step up” to win Grammys—raped a foreign recording artist, who is also a member of the Academy, after the artist’s performance at Carnegie Hall. The woman isn’t identified by name, but the lawsuit states that according to the her attorney, “a psychiatrist confirmed that the sexual encounter between her and Mr. Portnow was likely not consensual.”
Dugan said she learned of the rape allegation in May 2019 during a meeting with the Grammys board of directors, which took place before her tenure as chief executive officially began. “The news was presented to Ms. Dugan as though the Board had just learned of the allegation,” her lawyers said. “In reality they were well aware of the allegation at the time Ms. Dugan agreed to take on the CEO position, but never told her.”
At the time, the full board had not yet been notified of the allegation against Portnow, even though the group was preparing to decide whether to give the former CEO a bonus for his past work. Dugan says she suggested the vote take place after the board was informed of the accusations. The complaint also alleges that before learning of the accusations, the board asked Dugan to hire Portnow as a consultant with a pay of $750,000, but Dugan rejected the idea.
Portnow vehemently denied the rape allegations in a statement to Billboard on Wednesday, saying, in part:
“The allegations of rape are ludicrous, and untrue. The suggestion that there was is disseminating a lie. The baseless complaint about my conduct referenced in the EEOC filing was immediately brought to the attention of the Board of Director’s Executive Committee. An in-depth independent investigation by experienced and highly regarded lawyers was conducted and I was completely exonerated. There was no basis for the allegations and once again I deny them unequivocally.”
A December 2019 email Dugan wrote to the managing director of human resources is also included in the legal documents. In it she mentions the “sexual harassment claim made against Neil” along with her other complaints.
Dugan's Forced Leave
According to Dugan's claim, she ultimately contacted human resources via email on December 22, moved to speak out about her alleged encounter with Katz, the sexual assault allegation against Portnow, the board's pushback on diversifying the Academy, and other events that gave her "serious pause for concern." Days later, Dugan’s attorney warned the Academy that she would take legal action.
The Academy tried to reach a settlement with Dugan, her claim says, but it backed out of negotiations and a chairman of the board presented Dugan with an “unacceptable” alternative agreement, which she refused. The board then put her on administrative leave in an act of “retaliation” and relayed “thinly veiled threats of termination” if she pursued legal action against the Academy, her claim alleges.
Dugan's filing says the board also leaked news of her leave to the press and claimed her exit followed “concerns raised to the Recording Academy board of trustees, including a formal allegation of misconduct by a senior female member of the Recording Academy team.” Dugan denied these claims as “completely false and defamatory.”
Per Dugan's complaint, the misconduct accusation was stretched from an experience she had with her executive assistant, Claudine Little, not a “senior female member” of the Academy. During their time working together, Dugan claims she and other colleagues had issues with Little’s “conduct,” but she didn’t fire her. However, after a presentation Dugan gave the board in November, Little sent the Academy a “demand letter” that “falsely accused Ms. Dugan of bullying,” according to Dugan’s filing. She denies that Little’s concerns were the reason she was placed on leave.
On top of all that, a chair of the board published a “false, retaliatory and defamatory letter” about Dugan the day before she filed her discrimination charge, according to the complaint.
When asked during her GMA interview why she waited until after being ousted from her position to speak out on the ongoings within the Recording Academy, Dugan responded, “Because I actually wanted to make change from within—I moved across the country, I had a great job and I believe that the Recording Academy should stand for its artists.”
Pay Discrepancy
Dugan claims she was “was paid substantially less than her two male predecessors” as she took on the role of Recording Academy CEO. When she asked to be paid equally to Neil Portnow, her most recent predecessor, her request was denied. She was told to be “happy to be earning more than she had in her previously role” as CEO of (RED). The board apparently knew her pay at the last role because not-for-profits are required to publicly disclose executive salaries.
It’s currently unclear exactly how much Dugan was making during her Grammys tenure, but Portnow was paid $1.74 million in 2016, according to data from the Internal Revenue Service, per The New York Times. The same year, Dugan earned $537,000 as CEO of (RED).
“This attitude and conduct, of course, perpetuates the gender pay gap and is the reason that many states, including California, have banned employers from asking potential hires about prior compensation information,” Dugan’s claim says. The pay disparity was one of Dugan’s several complaints that contribute to the “boys club” culture permeating the Academy.
In addition to the pay disparity, Dugan's filing alleges that there were other “concerning” financial dealings, including the claim that board members “approved hundreds of thousands of dollars in payments to themselves for work that was either unnecessary or that was already being performed by outside vendors.”
The Grammys ceremony airs Sunday, January 26, at 8 p.m. ET.
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