Morgan Freeman has come out fighting against a CNN report that detailed allegations of sexual harassment and inappropriate behaviour towards women in the workplace.
Freeman’s lawyer is demanding CNN retract its story accusing the Oscar-winning actor of sexual harassment, calling it a “year-long witch hunt” against Freeman that has caused damage to his reputation and career.
In a letter given to Starts at 60 and written to CNN president Jeff Zucker, Freeman’s lawyer Robert M. Schwarts claims the article, in which eight women accused Freeman of harassment and inappropriate behaviour, was used to “unjustly attack” him.
Freeman’s team demanded on Tuesday that CNN at the very least “issue a retraction and apologise to Mr. Freeman through the same channels, and with the same level of attention, that it used to unjustly attack him on May 24”.
In his 10-page letter, Schwartz accused one of the co-authors of the report, Chloe Melas, of pursuing the story based on something she believed Freeman said to her during a press junket for his film Going In Style.
Melas, who was six months pregnant at the time of the alleged incident, told CNN‘s Headline News that Freeman said to her, “Boy do I wish I was there”. She added he was also “looking me up and down”.
But Schwartz said Freeman’s comment was in response to a story his co-star Michael Caine had just told. “Chloe Melas, had no reasonable basis to have interpreted what Mr. Freeman said or did at the Going In Style interview last year as having been directed at her or as any form of harassment. The videotape confirms that his statement had nothing to do with her and was not harassing.” Schwartz wrote.
CNN, however isn’t backing down. A spokesman for the network hit back at the letter in a statement, and noted that Freeman had initially apologised after the story broke, NBC reported.
“The unfounded accusations made by Mr. Freeman’s lawyer are disappointing and are difficult to reconcile with Mr. Freeman’s own public statements in the aftermath of the story,” the statement reads, according to NBC News. “CNN stands by its reporting and will respond forcefully to any attempt by Mr. Freeman or his representatives to intimidate us from covering this important public issue.”
Freeman originally issued an apology after the report surfaced, noting he wasn’t someone who would “intentionally offend or knowingly make anyone feel uneasy”.
“I am devastated that 80 years of my life is now at risk of being undermined, in the blink of an eye, by Thursday’s media reports,” he said in a statement shared by New York Times writer Sopan Deb on Twitter. “All victims of assault and harassment deserve to be heard. And we need to listen to them. But it is not right to equate horrific incidents of sexual assault with misplaced compliments or humour.”
https://twitter.com/SopanDeb/status/1000211609233580033
The 80-year-old star has already faced professional consequences. Visa suspended a marketing campaign with the actor and the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, decided not to remove Freeman as the voice of its public transit system.
It is unclear if the allegations will have any impact on Freeman’s previous awards. Earlier this year, the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) honoured the star with the Life Achievement Award.