Asia Argento and Rose McGowan seem to have the dissolution of their once-famous friendship play out on social media in the most high-profile way. After Argento became the center of headlines pertaining to her alleged sexual assault of an underage actor, McGowan has been vocal about her relationship with her #MeToo compatriot being fractured. And in the latest development, it appears the damage has been done, as Argento is now threatening legal action against her former friend.
In a new tweet, Argento said, “Dear @RoseMcGowan. It is with genuine regret that I am giving you 24 hours to retract and apologise for the horrendous lies made against me in your statement of August 27th. If you fail to address this libel I will have no option other than to take immediate legal action.”
We’re no experts, but this sort of tweet/threat seems to have no legal standing. However, it’s clear that Argento is moving on to the next part of her redemption angle as she tries to clear her name. For those not following along, Argento now claims that McGowan lied in her recent statement that broke down the chain of events that led to the NY Times article about the alleged assault.
McGowan claimed:
“I received a phone call and series of messages from the being I’ve been dating- Rain Dove. They said that they had been texting with Asia and that Asia had revealed that she had indeed slept with Jimmy Bennet. Rain also shared that Asia had stated that she’d been receiving unsolicited nudes of Jimmy since he had been 12. Asia mentioned in these texts that she didn’t take any action on those images. No reporting to authorities, to the parents, or blocking of Jimmy’s social media.”
This was followed about a week later from a tweet from Argento, showing that the aforementioned Rain Dove had retracted their previous statement about Bennett’s age, saying now that he was 17, not 12, when he began sending nude images. Argento asked for McGowan to retract her statement.
That never happened, which led Argento to release a new statement, through her lawyer, further defending her claims that the Bennett assault allegations were completely unfounded. In fact, her lawyer claimed that Argento was the true victim. The lawyer’s statement said that Argento and Bennett had engaged in sexual activity (contrary to her original statement) but that the young man pushed himself on her, and she “froze.” “Asia chose at the time not to prosecute Bennett for sexually attacking her,” said the lawyer (via Deadline).
The lawyer then doubled down on previous claims that Anthony Bourdain, Argento’s partner, had gone out of his way to set up the monetary compensation to keep Bennett quiet, saying, “Asia was completely against this approach because she had done nothing wrong and especially since the incident was initiated and perpetrated by Bennett against her, but she respected Anthony’s choice to avoid the potential intrusion into their relationship and the negative impact it might have against Bourdain and his high profile position in the Media community.”
Now, it appears that tomorrow, if Argento is to believed, McGowan can expect a nice bit of legal action, and the once-strong friendship will fully be destroyed.
Dear @RoseMcGowan. It is with genuine regret that I am giving you 24 hours to retract and apologise for the horrendous lies made against me in your statement of August 27th. If you fail to address this libel I will have no option other than to take immediate legal action.
— Asia Argento (@AsiaArgento) September 17, 2018
It is a shame that @rosemcgowan is not prepared to accept when she is wrong. @raindovemodel accepted she was wrong, but her tweet has been deleted. Rose's statement continues to make false claims. pic.twitter.com/OcHyJp6Rum
— Asia Argento (@AsiaArgento) September 7, 2018