Warren Beatty, the famed Bonnie and Clyde actor and Oscar-winning director, was accused in a lawsuit this week of sexually assaulting a girl in 1973 when she was 14 and 15.
The suit, filed Monday in Los Angeles Superior Court, alleges that Beatty used his status as a Hollywood star to “groom, manipulate, exploit and coerce sexual contact” with a minor.
The plaintiff, Kristina Charlotte Hirsch, alleges that the abuse took place over several months after she met Beatty on a film set in Los Angeles when he was about 35. Although the lawsuit does not refer to Beatty by name, it identifies the primary defendant as an actor who was nominated for an Academy Award for portraying Clyde in Bonnie and Clyde, as Beatty was in 1968.
Representatives for Beatty, now 85, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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The lawsuit was filed under a California law from 2019 that allows adults to temporarily override the statute of limitations and file claims related to sexual abuse that are decades old. The so-called look-back window for lawsuits from people older than 40 expires January 1st.
In the lawsuit, Hirsch describes a relationship with Beatty that began with him commenting on her looks and providing his phone number before extending invitations to his hotel room. She says he offered to help her with homework and took her on car rides.
Eventually, she says, their interactions came to include “oral sex, simulated sex and finally coerced sexual intercourse”. Hirsch is suing for damages for “severe emotional, physical and psychological distress” that she says continues to this day.
Hirsch’s lawyers, Michael Reck and Michael G Finnegan, declined to comment, saying they would let the complaint speak for itself.
The younger brother of actress Shirley MacLaine, Beatty emerged as Hollywood royalty in the 1960s. His role in Bonnie and Clyde, which he both starred in and produced, cemented his status as a maverick filmmaker and central figure in what became known as the New Hollywood of the 1970s.
The film’s graphic and morally ambivalent portrayal of the violent outlaws divided critics. Beatty went on to success as a director with the hit comedy Heaven Can Wait and won an Academy Award in 1982 for directing the political drama Reds, which he also starred in.
Beatty, who became nearly as known for his relationships with famous women off screen as for his performances, has been married to actress Annette Bening since 1992. – This article originally appeared in The New York Times
