Morgan Freeman accused of sexual misconduct and sexual harassment by 8 women
Morgan Freeman, the 80-year-old actor perhaps who became a household name after his roles in Driving Miss Daisy and Along Came a Spider is the latest to face a reckoning with sexual misconduct and sexual harassment according to multiple reports. Freeman is also being accused of fostering a work environment at his company Revelations Entertainment that the women who worked for him described as “toxic.”
Many said that it was a common practice for them to police their own wardrobes around Freeman so as not to draw his unwanted attention to their bodies. A former executive at Revelations Entertainment said of Freeman:
[He would] stand maybe within an inch of [a woman’s] face and just look them up and down and not say anything and then would move on to the next woman, and he’d stand like within an inch of their face and look them up and down and not say anything, and it was really, really strange… It was really weird, and he did it to every woman. But of course he didn’t do it to any of the men. He didn’t speak to any of the men.
Chloe Melas, a reporter at CNN, said during a segment on Freeman that she had her own inappropriate experiences with him. “Right when I walked into the room, he began to make sexually suggestive comments to me… As an entertainment reporter for over a decade, it was unlike anything I’ve ever experienced.” According to Melas, during promotion for last year’s film Going In Style when she was six months pregnant, Freeman looked her up and down and remarked “You are ripe” and “Boy do I wish I was there.”
Freeman issued an apology after the CNN report ran yesterday [one of the authors of that report was Chloe Melas]. It tepidly reads: “Anyone who knows me or has worked with me knows I am not someone who would intentionally offend or knowingly make anyone feel uneasy. I apologize to anyone who felt uncomfortable or disrespected — that was never my intent.”
Entertainment Tonight released footage on Thursday that shows Freeman asking a young female reporter during his promotional interviews for London Has Fallen, “My goodness, are you married? Fool around with other guys? I’m just asking.” In a 2015 interview with Janet Mock, told her, “You got a dress halfway between your knee and your hips, and you sit down right across from me and you cross your legs.” Mock later described Freeman’s comments as an “exhibition of the casual nature at which men in positions of power believe that everything belongs to them, including women’s bodies.”
Despite Freeman’s objections and self-testimonial to the merits of his character, he has already been dropped from ad campaigns by Visa, and there are reports that SAG-AFTRA is trying to decide whether or not revoke the Lifetime Achievement Award he received in January. “These are compelling and devastating allegations which are absolutely contrary to all the steps that we are taking to [ensure] a safe work environment for the professionals in this industry,” says a SAG-AFTRA spokesperson. “Any accused person has the right to due process, but it is our starting point to believe the courageous voices who come forward to report incidents of harassment… Given Mr. Freeman recently received one of our union’s most prestigious honors recognizing his body of work, we are therefore reviewing what corrective actions may be warranted at this time.”
Watch the aforementioned CNN segment below: