Groping in hotel made me a recluse, says actor Fraser

BRENDAN FRASER, the actor, has revealed he was left depressed and “reclusive” after he was publicly groped by a former president of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association.

Fraser, 49, said that he was introduced to Philip Berk, a former president of the powerful organisation that awards the Golden Globes, in a crowded room at the Beverly Hills Hotel in 2003.

Berk, in his memoir, says he pinched Fraser’s bottom in jest. But Fraser accuses him of going much further.

“His left hand reaches around, grabs my ass cheek, and one of his fingers touches me in the taint,” he told GQ magazine. “And he starts moving it around. I felt ill. I felt like a little kid. I felt like there was a ball in my throat. I thought I was going to cry.”

Berk, who is still an HFPA member, disputed Fraser’s account, describing it as “a total fabrication”. Fraser’s representatives asked the HFPA for a written apology, which Berk provided.

Berk, however, told GQ: “My apology admitted no wrongdoing, the usual ‘If I’ve done anything that upset Mr Fraser, it was not intended and I apologise.’” Fraser, a ubiquitous presence on film screens in the Nineties and early 2000s, including a starring role in The Mummy, said the incident left him deeply traumatised.

The father of three teenage boys, who separated from Afton, his wife, in 2009, added that the experience “made me retreat. It made me feel reclusive”.

The HFPA said that the magazine interview had given new details of the incident, and it was investigating.