From today’s installment of Anne Thompson’s Risky Biz Blog:
Moore segued to the subject of Mel Gibson, revealing for the first time that Gibson cost Moore his chance to be a Time Man of the Year. “I got a call right after the ’04 election,” Moore said, “from an editor from Time Magazine. He said, ‘Time Magazine has picked you and Mel Gibson to be Time’s Person of the Year to put on the cover, Right and Left, Mel and Mike. The only think you have to do is pose for a picture with each other. And do an interview together.’ I said ‘OK.’ They call Mel up, he agrees. They set the date and time in LA. I’m to fly there. He’s flying from Australia. Something happens when he gets home. Maybe he went to church for guidance and God spoke to him and said, ‘No way you’re doing a cover with Michael Moore.'” (laughter) “Next thing, Mel calls up and says, ‘I’m not doing it. I’ve thought it over and it is not the right thing to do.’ So they put Bush on the cover.”
2004, of course, was the year of Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ and Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11 (my review). Interestingly, despite Moore’s anecdote, it does not appear that either he or Gibson made the magazine’s list of “People Who Mattered” that year, either, based on the info here.
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