The disgraced film producer Harvey Weinstein has denied Salma Hayek’s claims that the actress had to repeatedly say no to his sexual advances, and that he forced her to perform a gratuitous sex scene in her well-regarded Frida Kahlo biopic, in order to let the film see the light of day.
Hayek made the claims Wednesday in an op-ed for The New York Times, in which she described Weinstein as “my monster.” She is the latest in a long string of actresses who have come forward to accuse Weinstein of sexual harassment, sexual assault or rape. Weinstein has denied all accounts of nonconsensual sex.
According to Hayek, the producer once threatened to kill her when she refused his advances.
“All of the sexual allegations as portrayed by Salma are not accurate and others who witnessed the events have a different account of what transpired,” Weinstein said in a statement released through his spokeswoman.
Weinstein said he did “not recall pressuring Salma to do a gratuitous sex scene with a female costar and he was not there for the filming.”
One of Hayek’s co-stars in Frida was Ashley Judd, who has also detailed sexual harassment by Weinstein. According to Hayek’s account, director Julie Taymor had tried to satisfy Weinstein’s demand for a lesbian sex scene by including a tango between the two women that ended in a kiss, but was unsuccessful.
In her op-ed, Hayek writes that Weinstein complained about parts of her Kahlo portrayal that were true to the subject but that conflicted with the actress’s sex appeal—namely her unibrow and limp. To that point, Weinstein said in his statement: “The original unibrow used was an issue because it diverted attention from the performances.”