Kate Beckinsale is the latest actress to add her name to a disturbingly long list of women who say that Miramax co-founder Harvey Weinsteinsexually assaulted or harassed them.
On Thursday, the 44-year-old actress detailed the first time she met the Hollywood executive in a statement on Instagram.
Beckinsale said she was just 17 years old when she was asked to meet with Weinstein at a hotel.
“I assumed it would be in a conference room which was very common,” Beckinsale wrote on Instagram. “When I arrived, reception told me to go to his room. He opened the door in his bathrobe.”
“I was incredibly naive and young and it did not cross my mind that this older, unattractive man would expect me to have any sexual interest in him,” Beckinsale continued. The actress said she turned down an offer of alcohol and said that she had school the next morning, leaving the room “uneasy but unscathed.”
The troubling allegations don’t end there. Beckinsale claims that years later, Weinstein asked her if anything had happened between them during their first meeting.
“I realized he couldn’t remember if he had assaulted me or not,” she wrote.
The actress said that she “said no to him professionally many times over the years,” which sometimes led to outbursts, “screaming at me calling me a cunt and making threats.”
Beckinsale believes these alleged incidents with Weinstein “undoubtedly harmed” her career.
Beckinsale also praised the women who came forward before her, such as Cara Delevingne, Angelina Jolie and Gwyneth Paltrow, after the New York Times and The New Yorker released exposés on Weinstein’s sexual misconduct. She also tried to encourage other women to speak out as well.
“For every moment like this there have been thousands where a vulnerable person has confided outrageous unprofessional behavior and found they have no recourse, due to an atmosphere of fear that it seems almost everyone has been living in,” she wrote.
In the week since the exposés on Weinstein, the executive was fired from his position at the Weinstein Company and his actions roundly condemned by Hollywood and political heavyweights, including Barack and Michelle Obama. On Wednesday, Disney announced that Weinstein’s name would be removed as a producer on an upcoming film.
CORRECTION: A previous version of this article suggested Beckinsale rejected sexual advances from Weinstein over the years, which Beckinsale did not express in her Instagram post.
