Danny Masterson “did not seem terribly distraught” after being sentenced to 30 years in prison for rape.
Artist Mona Shafer Edwards, who captured the viral courtroom sketch of the That ’70s Show actor, 47, blowing wife Bijou Phillips, 43, a kiss before being led away on Thursday, details to Yahoo Entertainment her observations from the Los Angeles courtroom. Edwards did five sketches during the camera-free sentencing — “I work really fast and just sort of crank them out” — and was the first to report the PDA interaction.
“No one noticed it,” Edwards says of Masterson’s air kiss to the pained-looking actress/model, whom he married in 2011. “Everybody’s taking notes. He got up to be led out — he was not shackled or handcuffed at all, which has been reported — and I was sitting right behind his wife and he winked at her and then he blew a kiss.”
Once Edwards’s sketch was released, she saw the reporting of the awkwardly timed kiss (described by one on social media as “creepy”) everywhere, but “I reported it first because I look at everything,” she says of her illustration style. “I see everything. I look at people. I study.” One thing she doesn’t do is refine a drawing over and over until it’s perfect. She captures the moment, quickly as it happens, and then moves on without refining it.
The seasoned artist — who has captured court sketches of Lori Loughlin, Gwyneth Paltrow, Michael Jackson, the Kardashians, Mel Gibson and O.J. Simpson, among others — covered both of Masterson’s rape trials as well as the sentencing, giving her a bird’s-eye view.
“He did not seem terribly distraught,” she says of Masterson’s demeanor at the sentencing, “and I’ve been looking at him now for two years.”
During victim impact statements, which were “really descriptive and fueled by strong emotions” as the women detailed being drugged and raped at Masterson’s Hollywood Hills home in 2003 — she says Masterson looked at them “with no emotion.”
Earlier, during both trials, his body language came off as “a little bit flip,” she says. “Almost like: ‘What am I doing here?’” with his body language. Even when the victims testified, “He had almost like an impish smile. I’m not gonna say he was laughing or smirking, but there was a slight like elfin smile. He struck me as being very pixieish.”