Weinstein faces a fourth rape claim
Now accuser Rose McGowan says she was raped ... and blasts boss who ignored her
‘Found myself fending him off’
THE Harvey Weinstein scandal deepened further last night as actress Rose McGowan accused him of raping her, and still more women came forward with sexual harassment allegations.
Miss McGowan had been one of eight women initially identified as having accepted payoffs from the film producer over sexual harassment claims.
She reportedly received £75,200 ($100,000) over an ‘episode in a hotel room during the Sundance Film Festival’.
And in a series of tweets, Miss McGowan, 44, made clear that Weinstein had actually raped her.
Three other women have already accused the film mogul of raping them – director Asia Argento, former aspiring actress Lucia Evans and a third woman interviewed in the New Yorker magazine.
Miss McGowan had previously said she had been raped by an unidentified ‘Hollywood studio head’. And in a series of new tweets the Charmed actress has now told Amazon founder Jeff Bezos that the boss of the firm’s Studio arm – Roy Price – ignored her complaints about Weinstein. ‘I told the head of your studio that HW raped me,’ she wrote. ‘Over and over I said it. He said it hadn’t been proven. I said I was the proof.’ Over several messages, she urged Mr Bezos so ‘ stop funding rapists’ and ‘stand with the truth’.
Canadian actress Erika Rosenbaum has also now joined the list of more than 30 actresses and former Weinstein staff – including Angelina Jolie, Gwyneth Paltrow and Kate Beckinsale – who say they were sexually harassed or assaulted by the producer. The actress, who appeared in Smurfs 2, said she had to fend off advances from Weinstein on three occasions nearly 15 years ago.
In one incident, she says Weinstein – who met her in his hotel room on the pretext of discussing her career – grabbed her by the neck in front of a mirror while fondling himself. ‘He did that while looking me right in the eye,’ she said.
‘I suddenly found myself fending him off, as though we were on a first date and he was making unwanted advances.’ Another new accuser, US actress Minka Kelly recalled how she agreed to meet Weinstein at a restaurant to supposedly discuss her career after refusing to visit his hotel room.
She says he told her: ‘I know you were feeling what I was feeling when we met the other night’, before he ‘ regaled me with offers of a lavish life filled with trips around the world on private planes etc if I would be his girlfriend’.
The actress, now 37, said: ‘I told him while flattered, I’d like to keep things professional.’ She then left after he asked her to never repeat what had happened, she said.
After British actress Sophie Dix accused Weinstein of pinning her down and performing a sex act in front of her in a room at London’s Savoy hotel in 1990, her co-star Colin Firth expressed shame that he had not acted on what she told him about a ‘distressing encounter’ she’d had with Weinstein. ‘I don’t think she went into all the horrific detail… but I remember her being profoundly upset by it. To my shame, I merely expressed sympathy.’
Nicole Kidman, who worked with Weinstein and has already applauded his accusers for coming forward, urged actresses to ‘make sure you are protected’.
And director Quentin Tarantino, a longtime collaborator of Weinstein, said he was ‘stunned and heartbroken’. Describing the producer as a ‘friend for 25 years’, he said he needed ‘a few more days to process [his] pain, emotions, anger and memory’ before commenting further.