Morgan Freeman has issued a statement — that includes an apology — after eight women came forward to accuse him of sexual harassment and inappropriate behavior.
“Anyone who knows me or has worked with me knows I am not someone who would intentionally offend or knowingly make anyone feel uneasy,” the 80-year-old actor said in a statement to Us Weekly on Thursday, May 24. “I apologize to anyone who felt uncomfortable or disrespected — that was never my intent.”
Earlier on Thursday, CNN published an investigative report based on interviews with 16 different people who claimed to either witness or be victims of the Oscar winner’s alleged inappropriate behavior.
A senior member of the production staff for 2013’s Now You See Me alleged to the network that Freeman commented on her and her female assistant’s bodies on the set. “We knew that if he was coming by … not to wear any top that would show our breasts, not to wear anything that would show our bottoms, meaning not wearing clothes that [were] fitted,” she told CNN.
Another young production assistant claimed to CNN that Freeman “kept trying to lift up my skirt and asking if I was wearing underwear” on the set of 2017’s Going in Style. She added that he did not stop until his costar Alan Arkin told him to.
CNN’s own Chloe Melas also alleged that Freeman acted inappropriately toward her that same year at a press junket for the film when she was six months pregnant. She claimed he told her she was “ripe” and repeatedly looked her up and down.
Additionally, a former male employee at Revelations Entertainment, Freeman’s movie production company, alleged to CNN that the Shawshank Redemption star was “verbally inappropriate.”
“It’s hard because on any set he is the most powerful person on it,” he told CNN. “It’s weird because you just don’t expect it from Morgan Freeman, someone who you respect.”
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