Harvey Weinstein Reacts After Salma Hayek Calls Him 'Monster' in Sexual Harassment Claims
Celebrity

In an op-ed published in The New York Times, the Mexican actress alleges that Weinstein threatened to kill her after she rejected his unwanted sexual advances multiple times.

AceShowbiz - Salma Hayek has detailed the alleged sexual harassment she suffered at the hands of Harvey Weinstein. In an op-ed published in The New York Times titled "Harvey Weinstein Is My Monster Too", the actress reveals that the disgraced movie mogul harassed her multiple times when they worked together on "Frida".

"I knew him a little bit through my relationship with the director Robert Rodriguez and the producer Elizabeth Avellan, who was then his wife, with whom I had done several films and who had taken me under their wing," she writes. "All I knew of Harvey at the time was that he had a remarkable intellect, he was a loyal friend and a family man."

"Knowing what I know now," she continues, "I wonder if it wasn't my friendship with them - and Quentin Tarantino and George Clooney - that saved me from being raped." After she signed a deal with him for "Frida" and several other films with Miramax, "Little did I know it would become my turn to say no," Hayek says.

"No to opening the door to him at all hours of the night, hotel after hotel, location after location, where he would show up unexpectedly, including one location where I was doing a movie he wasn't even involved with. No to me taking a shower with him. No to letting him watch me take a shower. No to letting him give me a massage. No to letting a naked friend of his give me a massage. No to letting him give me oral sex. No to my getting naked with another woman. No, no, no, no, no," she recalls.

"And with every refusal came Harvey's Machiavellian rage," Hayek adds, alleging that Weinstein even threatened to kill her, "The range of his persuasion tactics went from sweet-talking me to that one time when, in an attack of fury, he said the terrifying words, 'I will kill you, don't think I can't.' "

Once filming started, Weinstein allegedly threatened to shut down the production if Hayek wouldn't perform a full-frontal sex scene with Ashley Judd in the film. Judd herself was among the first actresses who came forward with sexual harassment allegations against the former movie producer.

She eventually agreed to do it after being pressured by Weinstein. "My mind understood that I had to do it, but my body wouldn't stop crying and convulsing," she recalls. "At that point, I started throwing up while a set frozen still waited to shoot. I had to take a tranquilizer, which eventually stopped the crying but made the vomiting worse. As you can imagine, this was not sexy, but it was the only way I could get through the scene."

But even after she did the scene, Weinstein continued his interference in the film. Hayek remembers Weinstein thought the scene wasn't good enough and wanted to release "Frida" only in a single theater in New York. After fighting with director Julie Taymor, he agreed to open the film in Los Angeles as well.

The 51-year-old Mexican beauty explains why she decided to come forward with her story now. "I am inspired by those who had the courage to speak out, especially in a society that elected a president who has been accused of sexual harassment and assault by more than a dozen women and whom we have all heard make a statement about how a man in power can do anything he wants to women. Well, not anymore," she says.

Responding to the accusations, Weinstein denies Hayek's claims. "All of the sexual allegations as portrayed by [Hayek] are not accurate and others who witnessed the events have a different account of what transpired," his spokesperson says in a statement.

In the statement, the spokesperson says Weinstein "regards Salma Hayek as a first-class actress" and acknowledges that "there was creative friction" on the set of "Frida". The spokesperson adds, "By Mr. Weinstein's own admission, his boorish behavior following a screening of 'Frida' was prompted by his disappointment in the cut of the movie," noting that "the movie opened in multiple theaters and was supported by a huge advertising campaign and an enormous Academy Awards budget."

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