Co-Producer For Oscars Steps Down

Brett Ratner abruptly resigned as the co-producer of next year’s Oscar broadcast on Tuesday as outcry over his use of an antigay slur and his sex talk on Howard Stern’s radio show threatened to disrupt the annual awards broadcast.

In a statement late Tuesday, Mr. Ratner said he had resigned in a morning phone conversation with Tom Sherak, the president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which awards the Oscars.

“He did the right thing, and they did the right thing,” Rob Epstein, a member of the academy’s governing board and a director of “The Celluloid Closet,” said of Mr. Ratner and the academy on Tuesday. “I’m proud to be associated with a group that made the right call.”

Whether Mr. Ratner’s resignation would affect Eddie Murphy’s plans to host the Oscar telecast, set for Feb. 26 on ABC, remained unclear. Mr. Murphy’s agents and publicist had no immediate response when questioned Tuesday evening.

Mr. Ratner is a brash director known as much for Hollywood high jinks as his films. The latest film, “Tower Heist,” opened to mediocre ticket sales on Friday.

Mr. Ratner over the weekend stirred disapproval in the academy ranks and among media observers when, at a public question-and-answer session about his film, he used a pejorative term for homosexual men.

Even as Mr. Ratner was apologizing and the academy was dealing with the fallout, fresh controversy erupted around a Monday interview on Mr. Stern’s Sirius XM Radio show.

In the freewheeling interview, Mr. Ratner discussed his sex habits and encounters with actresses, including Lindsay Lohan.

In his statement, couched as an “open letter” to the entertainment industry, Mr. Ratner said, “Over the last few days, I’ve gotten a well-deserved earful from many of the people I admire most in this industry.”

He added: “To them, and to everyone I’ve hurt and offended, I’d like to apologize publicly and unreservedly.” Mr. Ratner, in his statement, said he planned to take “real action” over the coming months to help stamp out what he called the kind of “thoughtless bigotry” he had touched off.