Actress Susan Sarandon launched a blistering attack on Woody Allen at the Cannes Film Festival as allegations of sexual abuse have been renewed against the director.
The outspoken actress says she has nothing good to say about the director accused of abusing his adopted daughter.
Speaking at a panel discussing women’s issues in the film industry, Sarandon said that she believes that the Hollywood director had ‘sexually assaulted a child and I don’t think that is right’.
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The Mail Online reports:
Sarandon was asked what she thought of comments by Allen earlier this week that he had no good material for a movie in which an older woman falls in love with a younger man.
‘I have nothing good to say about Woody Allen, so I don’t think we should go there,’ said the Oscar-winner, before repeating the allegations against him, which the director denies and which have never been proved in court.
The accusation that Allen abused his adopted daughter Dylan Farrow has continued to haunt the 80-year-old director at Cannes, where he premiered his latest film ‘Cafe Society’ on Wednesday.
Ahead of it, Allen’s son Ronan Farrow wrote a column slamming the media for failing to ask hard questions about the abuse case, which dates back to the early 1990s.
‘I believe my sister,’ wrote Farrow about that allegations made by Farrow when she was 7-years-old that she was inappropriately touched by their father.
‘This was always true as a brother who trusted her, and, even at 5 years old, was troubled by our father’s strange behavior around her: climbing into her bed in the middle of the night, forcing her to suck his thumb — behavior that had prompted him to enter into therapy focused on his inappropriate conduct with children prior to the allegations.’
He also took time to chide actors who continue to work with his father as well, writing; ‘Actors, including some I admire greatly, continue to line up to star in his movies. ”It’s not personal,’ one once told me. But it hurts my sister every time one of her heroes like Louis C.K., or a star her age, like Miley Cyrus, works with Woody Allen.
‘Personal is exactly what it is – for my sister, and for women everywhere with allegations of sexual assault that have never been vindicated by a conviction.’
The essay came one week after a cover story on the acclaimed auteur in The Hollywood Reporter and just as he has hit the Croisette with actresses Blake Lively and Kristen Stewart to open the Cannes Film festival with his new movie, Cafe Society.
Dylan, 30, had originally made the claims in an open letter in the New York Times outlining her father’s alleged abuse.
Her brother Ronan and their mother Mia Farrow have said they decided not to press charges in the 1990s due to Dylan’s ‘fragility’ at the time.
Following his daughter’s 2014 essay, Allen spoke out, calling the accusations ‘ludicrous’ and repeating his charge that Mia had ‘coached’ his daughter during their acrimonious split.
The director’s publicist Leslee Dart said ‘a thorough investigation was conducted by court-appointed independent experts’ at the time.
‘The experts concluded there was no credible evidence of molestation; that Dylan Farrow had an inability to distinguish between fantasy and reality; and that Dylan Farrow had likely been coached by her mother Mia Farrow,’ Ms Dart said.
‘Mr Allen has read the article and found it untrue and disgraceful.’
Allen’s lawyer Elkan Abramowitz added that the claims were a ‘story engineered by a vengeful lover’.
‘The one to blame for Dylan’s distress is neither Dylan nor Woody Allen,’ he said.
No charges were ever brought following the 1992 investigation, and Ms Farrow’s open letter never led to renewed legal action.
Niamh Harris
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