Grey’s Anatomy star Caterina Scorsone says James Toback sexually harassed her
She is one of a number of women to have made allegations against the director.
Actress Caterina Scorsone has accused director James Toback of sexual harassment.
The Grey’s Anatomy star responded to a recently published Rolling Stone interview given by Toback – in which he denied all previous allegations against him – and named him as the “fairly prominent director” who she alleged had made sexual advances towards her in her teens.
The Los Angeles Times has reported that more than 200 women have accused Toback, 72, of harassment.
At the time, she had kept the identity of the director anonymous, but has now said she was referring to Toback.
Scorsone wrote on Instagram: “In response to James Toback’s crass denial in Rolling Stone, I feel I must corroborate the stories of these women.
“I want to be clear that the predatory director I wrote about in the article I posted a few days back, was James Toback.
“The article was written 17 years ago. Many industry people knew about it and encouraged me to stay silent. I didn’t, and it directly affected my career. I stand with all the women who were brave enough to tell their stories.
In Scorsone’s original essay, she had alleged that she had met a director to discuss a possible film role.
“It became immediately and alarmingly clear that there was a rider on my eligibility for the role, and that this rider was explicitly sexual in nature,” she had said.
Scorsone had written that the director “launched into a semantic lecture about the nature and definition of sex, orgasm and the universe,” and that “when this failed to convince me, he called my vocation into question”.
She added: “He told me that I was repressed, and that, if I were a real actor like the half-dozen names he mentioned working with, I would be willing to trust him and just ‘go there’.”
Along with the article, posted on her Instagram page on October 16, Scorsone wrote: “I wrote this article 17 years ago. I was a teenager.
“She is an example of the good side of this industry. These examples exist. Let’s be done with the other kind. #metoo.”
Actresses Julianne Moore, Selma Blair and Rachel McAdams are among those who have accused Toback of harassment, following a report in The Los Angeles times which first published 38 claims against the Academy Award-nominated writer of 1991’s Bugsy.
In the Rolling Stone interview, which was published on October 27 but conducted on October 17 – five days before the original Los Angeles Times piece was published – Toback vehemently denied the allegations.
On Tuesday, the Beverly Hills Police department announced it is investigating Toback, along with film producer Harvey Weinstein, who has had a number of allegations made against him.
Police in Beverly Hills said no further information would be given about either of the investigations, but released statements saying “multiple complaints” had “recently” been made about both men.
Cruel Intentions and Hellboy star Blair and Oscar-nominee McAdams told Vanity Fair that Toback harassed them during auditions for his film Harvard Man in 1999.
Toback has not been directly contactable, but has denied allegations via The Los Angeles Times and the Rolling Stone interview.
Weinstein, 65, has denied allegations of non-consensual sex.
