American actor Dustin Hoffman has been accused of sexually harassing a 17-year-old intern in 1985. The incidents occurred on the sets of the TV adaptation of ‘Death of a Salesman’.
The woman is writer Anna Graham Hunter. She said she spent five weeks working with Hoffman as a production assistant for the Hollywood Reporter.
He reportedly asked her to give him a foot massage on the her first day on set, and she did.
“He was openly flirtatious, he grabbed my ass, he talked about sex to me and in front of me,” Hunter said. “One morning I went to his dressing room to take his breakfast order; he looked at me and grinned, taking his time. Then he said, “I’ll have a hard-boiled egg … and a soft-boiled clitoris.”
“I loved the attention from Dustin Hoffman. Until I didn’t,” she said.
During her time on set, she used to send detailed messages to her sister about how Hoffman repeatedly groped her and made inappropriate remarks. The correspondence has now been made public
“Today, when I was walking Dustin to his limo, he felt my ass four times. I hit him each time, hard, and told him he was a dirty old man. He took off his hat and pointed to his head (shaved for the part) and said, “No, I’m a dirty young man, I have a full head of hair,” she wrote in one of the messages to her sister.
She says that his behaviour was a known fact and was condoned on set. Superiors told her to ‘sacrifice some of our values’ to keep production running smoothly
Hoffman has issued an apology.
"I have the utmost respect for women and feel terrible that anything I might have done could have put her in an uncomfortable situation. I am sorry. It is not reflective of who I am,” he told The Hollywood Reporter.
Hoffman is just one of the many actors and producers who has been accused of sexual harassment in the past few months.
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Picture Credit: The AV club