Veteran actor Dreyfuss hit by sexual harassment allegations
A WRITER who worked for Richard Dreyfuss on a TV comedy special in the 1980s said he sexually harassed her for years and exposed himself to her in a studio lot trailer.
Jessica Teich told the New York magazine blog Vulture.com that the actor made continual, overt and lewd comments and invitations after they met at a theatre where she worked and Dreyfuss appeared.
Dreyfuss’s agent, Barry McPherson, denied the actor ever exposed himself to Teich but he acknowledged to Vulture other encounters Dreyfuss now realises were inappropriate.
The revelations were among fresh developments in the sexual harassment scandal that has rolled through Hollywood and other industries.
In 1987, when Teich was working for Dreyfuss on devel- opment of an ABC show script, she said she was summoned to his trailer on the set of one of his films and he exposed his genitals to her.
Dreyfuss said he thought the two were involved in a playful “consensual seduction ritual”. He told Vulture that he flirted with Teich but is now “horrified and bewildered to discover that it wasn’t consensual”.
On Saturday, George Takei took to Twitter to deny he ever knew a struggling actor and model who has accused him of sexual assault in 1981.
“The events he describes back in the 1980s simply did not occur, and I do not know why he has claimed them now,” the 80-year-old Takei said in a series of tweets.
Scott Brunton told The Hollywood Reporter he was 23 at the time, living in Holly- wood and working as a waiter when he met Takei at a bar. They exchanged numbers, he said, speaking by telephone from time to time, when Takei invited Brunton to dinner, the theatre and back to his apartment for drinks soon after Brunton had broken up with a boyfriend.
He said he grew dizzy and “must have passed out”, awaking to his pants around his ankles and Takei groping him.