Oscar-winning actress Lupita Nyong’o has joined the growing list of stars to accuse disgraced movie boss Harvey Weinstein of harassment. Nyong’o, who won best supporting actress for 12 Years A Slave, said on Thursday she was a drama school student when the “predator” lured her to his room under false pretences.
She wrote in The New York Times, the newspaper that published the initial bombshell report on Weinstein, that she was invited to his family home in Connecticut on the premise of watching a film shortly after they met in 2011. But she said shortly after it started he “insisted” in front of his children that she follow him and she was led to his bedroom. The Kenyan-Mexican actress, now 34, said she felt pressured into giving him a massage after he offered her one. “Before long he said he wanted to take off his pants,” she wrote.
“I told him not to do that and informed him that it would make me extremely uncomfortable. He got up anyway to do so and I headed for the door, saying that I was not at all comfortable with that.” Over the years that followed, he continued to get in touch, Nyong’o said, and when she declined another proposition she felt her career was threatened. Nyong’o said she had blamed herself and attempted to forget about her experiences but has felt “sick in the pit of my stomach” since dozens of women came forward to accuse him of sexual assault and harassment.
She said she is now speaking out to end the “conspiracy of silence”. Gwyneth Paltrow and Angelina Jolie are among the actresses to accuse Weinstein of sexual harassment, while Rose McGowan said he raped her. Weinstein has “unequivocally denied” allegations of non-consensual sex. Police in London, Los Angeles and New York are investigating the 65-year-old.
Source: The Independent
