Mira Sorvino has revealed a harrowing story about an audition she had at age 16 in which she says she was treated "inappropriately" and gagged with a condom.
Sorvino made the comments in an interview for the Hollywood Foreign Press Association’s podcast "In Conversation" while promoting new projects.
The 50-year-old actress was one of the first accusers of Harvey Weinstein, the Hollywood producer who now faces multiple criminal charges for sexual assault, which he denies.
Sorvino said she lost numerous roles when she refused to have a sexual relationship with various casting directors, including Weinstein.
Peter Jackson said in December he didn’t work with Sorvino or Ashley Judd because Weinsten-led Miramax told him in the late 1990s they were nightmares to work with and should be avoided, Stuff reported.
"Directors pressuring you to have relationships with them, people casting you saying if you have a sexual relationship with them they’ll give you the part," Sorvino said, "that has happened to me several times."
She told the podcast that a casting director for a horror movie she auditioned for when she was 16 tied her to a chair, bruised her arm, and gagged her.
“And I was all game because I’m trying to be scared for the scene,” she said. “And at the end, he takes the gag out of my mouth and he says, ‘Sorry for the prophylactic. ... That was one of my introductions to how the acting system works.”
Sorvino also said she regrets working with Woody Allen, who directed her in an Oscar-winning role in his 1995 film “Mighty Aphrodite.” Allen has been accused by daughter Dylan Farrow of molesting her when she was a child; he denies the claim.
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