Brad Pitt confronted Harvey Weinstein in the 1990s after the predatory movie mogul propositioned Gwyneth Paltrow, his then girlfriend, it has been claimed.
Paltrow had been quiet on Weinstein’s decades of sexual harassment until Tuesday when, in an interview with The New York Times, she too claimed that she had been victim to Weinstein’s sexual misconduct.
In the same interview, Pitt’s estranged wife Angelina Jolie identified herself as another victim.
They join Asia Argento, Rose McGowan, Ashley Judd, Rosanna Arquette and Mira Sorvino who all say they were at some point sexually harassed by Weinstein over the last 30 years.
In her interview on Tuesday, Paltrow told how Weinstein invited her to his room at the Peninsula Hotel to talk after giving her the title role in Emma, a 1996 adaptation of the Jane Austen novel.
Brad Pitt confronted Harvey Weinstein (above together in 2009) at a movie premiere in the mid 1990s after being told by his then girlfriend Gwyneth Paltrow that he had propositioned her
Pitt and Paltrow dated between 1994 and 1997, during which time she starred in the film Emma for Weinstein
Once inside, he placed his hands on her ‘suggestively’ and said they should go into the bedroom for massages, she said.
‘I was a kid, I was signed up, I was petrified,’ Paltrow recalled.
She rebuffed him and left promptly, later telling Pitt about the encounter.
Pitt confronted Weinstein at a theatre premiere and told him never to proposition Paltrow again.
His threat did not work. Instead, Weinstein called Paltrow and told her to never mention it to anyone else.
She said she feared her career would be over if she did not comply.
‘I thought he was going to fire me,’ she said on Tuesday.
Pitt and Paltrow dated from 1994 to 1997. He married Angelina Jolie, another of Weinstein’s unsuspecting victims, in 2014.
In an email to the New York Times on Tuesday, Jolie, who has since separated from Pitt, admitted she was once also targeted by Weinstein in the same way.
‘I had a bad experience with Harvey Weinstein in my youth, and as a result, chose never to work with him again and warn others when they did.
‘This behavior towards women in any field, any country is unacceptable,’ Jolie said.
Their encounter was in 1998 during the release of her film Playing by Heart.
Jolie and Paltrow are the latest stars to break their silence on the scandal that has been engulfing Weinstein since The New York Times revealed last week that he was the subject of decades-old allegations of sexual harassment.
At the time, Weinstein apologized for his behavior and said he had taken a leave of absence from his production company.
He however denies any non-consensual sex and, through a spokeswoman, pointed on on Tuesday in an email to the Times that ‘there were never any acts of retaliation against any women for refusing his advances.’
The accusations became on more serious on Tuesday when, in an in-depth article by The New Yorker, Italian actress Asia Argento accused Weinstein of raping her by forcible performing oral sex on her against her will in another hotel room.