Over 30 Women Come Forward And Accuse Director James Toback Of Sexual Harassment

The problem is so much worse than we think. Harvey Weinstein is just the tip of the iceberg.

Over 30 women are coming forward and accusing director James Toback of sexual harassment. The stories are all too similar to Harvey’s. It almost always starts out as an innocent conversation. Then it turns into an “I can make you famous” kind of thing. The directors try to prove how powerful they are in Hollywood and attempt to make aspiring actresses feel like they have to mess around with them in order to get ahead.

Then, in a hotel room, a movie trailer, a public park, meetings framed as interviews or auditions quickly turned sexual, according to 38 women who, in separate interviews told the Los Angeles Times of similar encounters they had with Toback.

It’s disgusting.

During these meetings, many of the women said, Toback boasted of sexual conquests with the famous and then asked humiliating personal questions. How often do you masturbate? How much pubic hair do you have? He’d tell them, they said, that he couldn’t properly function unless he “jerked off” several times a day. And then he’d dry-hump them or masturbate in front of them, ejaculating into his pants or onto their bodies and then walk away. Meeting over.

Brb. Hurling.

The women’s accounts portray James Toback as a man who, for decades, sexually harassed women he hired, women looking for work and women he just saw on the street. The vast majority of these women — 31 of the 38 interviewed — spoke on the record. The Times also interviewed people that the women informed of the incidents when they occurred.

Here’s where we go back to the hush-hush culture thing. None of the women contacted the police.

As is often the case with crimes of this nature, none of them contacted the police at the time. When contacted by The Times, Toback denied the allegations, saying that he had never met any of these women or, if he did, it “was for five minutes and have no recollection.” He also repeatedly claimed that for the last 22 years, it had been “biologically impossible” for him to engage in the behavior described by the women in this story, saying he had diabetes and a heart condition that required medication. Toback declined to offer further details.

However, the women have a different story.  Actress Adrienne LaValley said she had an extremely awkward and inappropriate encounter with Toback in a hotel room back in 2008. She said she felt like a “prostitute.”

“The way he presented it, it was like, ‘This is how things are done,’” actress Adrienne LaValley said of a 2008 hotel room encounter that ended with Toback trying to rub his crotch against her leg. When she recoiled, he stood up and ejaculated in his pants. “I felt like a prostitute, an utter disappointment to myself, my parents, my friends. And I deserved not to tell anyone.”

 

“In a weird sense, I thought, ‘This is a test of whether I’m a real artist and serious about acting,’” remembered Starr Rinaldi, who was an aspiring actress when Toback approached her in Central Park about 15 years ago. “He always wanted me to read for him in a hotel or come back to his apartment, like, ‘How serious are you about your craft?’”

 

“And the horrible thing is, whichever road you choose, whether you sleep with him or walk away, you’re still broken,” Rinaldi continued. “You have been violated.”

The stories are all pretty horrific. Louise Post actually said that Toback told her that he’d “love nothing more than to masturbate while looking into my eyes.”

GROSS.

There’s more where that came from, too. You can read the rest here.

LAT: More than 30 women come forward to accuse director James Toback of sexual harassment https://t.co/fRPKXA11LQ

— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) October 22, 2017

I’m starting to think the “swamp” is in Hollywood!

— Kate (@Lessafetoday08) October 22, 2017

In the ’80s, the late, lamented Spy magazine wrote about Toback’s purported creepiness, though I don’t remember any harassment accusations.

— John F.J. Sullivan (@io_saturnalia) October 22, 2017

The flood gates have opened. Let’s drag it all into the light.

— Jean (@setislady) October 22, 2017

Thank you for sharing our story, Jake, and thank you @GlennWhipp for giving us a voice.

— sari kamin (@sarikamin) October 22, 2017

Epidemic

— GETAnalysis.ca (@GETAnalysis) October 22, 2017

Um, about time. I don’t know anyone that didn’t know about Toback. He famously walked around U Square & solicit actresses to “ audition “.

— Terry Kinney (@RealTerryKinney) October 22, 2017

It just seems to get worse every day.😓

— Joyce Lawton (@ponymom48) October 22, 2017

This is clearly a common theme in Hollywood. And the fact remains that people knew about this– not just the women actually harassed. And like the Weinstein case, those people said nothing.

Hollywood is so gross.

The floodgates hath opened.

— Devin Comiskey (@devincomiskey) October 22, 2017

They sure have.

h/t LA Times