As the #MeToo and Time’s Up movements continue to gain traction in Hollywood and around the world, we’re going to hear from more and more women sharing their stories of inappropriate and damaging behavior. While Academy Award-nominated actress Chloe Sevigny has experienced her fair share of gross conduct from male Hollywood types, in a recent interview with The Guardian, she details how a female casting director had the most damaging impact.
“I’ve had experiences that are kind of common, verbal experiences, or innuendos. But I didn’t feel they offended me to such a degree that I wanted to name the names. I think they’re commonly known as assholes anyway. Do you know what I mean?” said the actress when asked if she’s experienced any inappropriate behavior from males in Hollywood.
She continues, “For someone to say, ‘What are you doing after?’ during a casting session is not so unheard of. Yeah, it shouldn’t be done and lots of girls might feel vulnerable and not know what to do in that situation. For me, it was like: really?”
However, even though the “Boys Don’t Cry” actress readily admits to experiencing much of the same inappropriate behavior from males, she will never forget what happened when a female casting director offered her some advice.
“I can’t even remember now who said it to me, but a female casting director said, in a room full of people: ‘You have to make the men want to fuck you and the women want to be you,’” Sevigny recalls.
“To think to myself, that’s really what I have to be? And then trying to figure out how to be that. This was from a casting person who was like, this is how you’re going to get the jobs and then that permeating through how I thought about myself, and the commodity I was. That was more damaging than the guy asking me what are you doing after or saying you should take your clothes off more. Shocker,” the actress admits.
Chloe Sevigny is making the rounds promoting her new film “Lean on Pete,” which we loved. The film is playing in select theaters now.