Gérard Depardieu is facing sexual abuse allegations from 13 more women.
Gérard Depardieu is facing sexual abuse allegations from 13 more women
The 74-year-old ‘Green Card’ actor has been hit by the accusations after French actress Charlotte Arnould, 33, accused the film icon of raping her at his Paris mansion in 2018.
He has vehemently denied the women’s claims after French online investigative newspaper Médiapart published a dossier on Wednesday (12.04.23) outlining how he allegedly preyed on them using similar methods, while shooting recent projects including Netflix’s crime drama ‘Marseille’.
A legal spokesman for the actor – the second highest grossing big-screen star in the history of French cinema behind Louis de Funès – said: “He formally denies all the charges likely to fall under criminal law.”
Médiapart’s report said: “Besides the complaint from Charlotte Arnould, we have gathered 13 accounts from women who say they were subjected to sexually inappropriate gestures or proposals by the famous actor, of differing levels of gravity.
“Across the different accounts, the same scene seemed to repeat itself. They are actresses, make-up artists and crew members.
“They attest to have been subjected to a hand on their buttock, between the legs, or on their thighs or stomach – as well as obscene sexual propositions, and sometimes insistent groaning.”
The outlet claims the incidents were “laughed off” by people saying: “Oh, ok, it’s just Gérard”, and states similarities between the women’s accounts include that thy were “young” and “precarious” actresses at the start of their careers when they were allegedly targeted.
None of the 13 new complaints are currently filed as a legal complaints.
It is said the actor’s alleged victims – some of whom anonymously reported the claims – feared they may never work again if they made an issue about their allegations against a star who has the heavyweight star power and cultural status to get movies funded.
Médiapart said there was an “asymmetry between, on the one hand, often young, precarious women, starting their career, and on the other, a world-famous actor, whose mere presence sometimes makes it possible to finance the film”.
Ms Arnould renounced her legal right to anonymity at the end of 2021 in protest at the length of time the investigation into her accusation is taking after Depardieu was charged with rape and sexual assault.
Within days of his indictment, the actor was back at work on the Paris set of police drama 'Maigret and the Dead Girl’.
There is CCTV footage of Depardieu performing a sex act on Ms Arnould in August 2018, but the actor said their relationship was consensual.
Ms Arnould went public at the end of 2021 by posting a message on Twitter saying: “I was raped by Gérard Depardieu.”
It was a year to the day since the actor was charged with attacking her at his Paris home in 2018 when she was aged 22.
Ms Arnould, who knew Depardieu since she was a child and has appeared in films including ‘The Art of the Crime’, added: “I am the victim of Depardieu. He's been indicted for over a year. I can no longer be silent.”
Depardieu is one of a series of power-players in the French arts establishment who were accused as part of the #MeToo movement of the rape or other abuse of young female models and actresses.
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